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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28842330">No Idea Survives Contact With The Artist</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrUndisclosed/pseuds/MrUndisclosed'>MrUndisclosed</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>NSR- Withinfinite [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>No Straight Roads (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Art, Bonding over which of your friends are the pretentious ones, Discussions of the creative process abound, Fluff, Friendship, Lots of complaining about creation, Lots of discussion of about the potential reason why we create, Massage, Neon J doesn't physically show up but is everyone's best friend and will show up later, Support Systems, That but with Zuke and Eve is pretty much the entire thesis statement of this fic, Trippy locations, You know that shipping dynamic that's like "god like being and a human who gets them or they enjoy?", touch starved</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 03:25:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>22,974</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28842330</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrUndisclosed/pseuds/MrUndisclosed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Zuke wakes up on an impossible beach with Eve and he can't quite recall how he got there. Soon enough it all comes flooding back and he really, genuinely, wishes for once that he knew people who dealt with their issues in normal ways. To make matters worse BBJ has a concert and no drummer,or does it?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>NSR- Withinfinite [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2151441</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>34</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Big fan of this franchise and bigger fan of the characters. Hopefully it's not too melancholic or bizarre but it was an idea that wouldn't go away.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“I think it’s cliche to say it; but I’m not in Vinyl City anymore.” Zuke woke to the sounds of the surf and a dampness that clung to him. The sky above him was an overcast grey with no breaks in sight. Everything ached, his arms and legs felt like he’d got them second hand and his lungs burned. Dog tired, West would say. </p><p>He coughed, his chest aching. He hadn’t ever been the kind to indulge in the party rocking lifestyle so he could at least discount that being the reason he was in such a state. Another cold cloying invasion, ice water raced up to his waistband and he hissed sitting up. </p><p>He almost wished he hadn’t. “Nope...nope….no….nope.” He said looking over the horizon, slowly sweeping one way and then the other. A vast endless ocean stretched out ahead of him. Jutting out of the ocean were arms, long, stone arms. Open palmed, clenched fist, index finger extended, middle fingers unto the sky itself wrought miles high and more. Hundreds of them, thousands of arrangements of hands and arms that drifted in the sea like icebergs. </p><p>The water though that was the warning sign. It was a bright pink tone, once more it splashed up to his waist and he shuddered. Too weak to move but not wanting to stay here. As the water receded the foam seemed to extend, grow into hands and limply try and drag him back into the water. </p><p>He blinked a few times, that wasn’t real. That was for sure not a real thing that happened. He looked up in time to see the wave crash over him. The water was cold, too cold. Once the wave retreated, leaving him laying once more on his back. He spat some of the pink water and stared up at the sky above. </p><p>“Yeah...we gotta move.” He told himself rolling over and dragging his wet sopping self up the pale sandy beach. White sand, pink water...he wasn’t exactly surprised to see someone standing ahead to meet him. </p><p>“Hello, Zuke.” Prim and exact, her hands behind her back and looking exactly as she had back in college there was Eve...or Nadia. This was before Eve wasn’t it? “I’d offer you a towel but I’m afraid I’ve not got one.” </p><p>“I’m sure we can find one.” Zuke said with a grin, as strange as this was a familiar face helped. She seemed to notice the smile and gave her own soft smile in return. “How are you, Eve?” </p><p>“Better now. It’s nice to have a familiar face.” </p><p>“I was just thinking the same thing because, Eve….” He looked past her at the city ahead. “I have no idea where we are.” It looked like a postcard he saw once before, somewhere tropical West had been maybe on one of his wanderings. All the buildings seemed like vast white cubes of chalk, stacked on top of each other along a spiral walkway. There was nobody he could see but him and Eve, just the bone white city and the pink ocean. </p><p>“You don’t recall?” Eve asked him leaning to one side. “Perhaps this was not the best idea. You arriving by the ocean was certainly not planned.”</p><p>“Why is it,” he gestured with a wave toward the water, “like that.” </p><p>“The sea always fascinated me.” Eve said warmly. “It was so many things all at once and seemingly without effort. It was an obstacle for certain, a thing that was so vast and unreal that the idea of crossing it must have seemed like madness for centuries. Yet it is a provider, with a little time and effort it will provide bounties of food and wealth for those who seek it. Then at the same time it is a mystery, we may never reach the bottom of the ocean and find all the wonders it has to display unto us. The sea is so many things and this sea too is all of those things.”</p><p>Zuke nodded slowly. “The ocean is a haunting but beautiful aspect of life, influencing every creative facet at least a little.” Zuke agreed. “I meant...more...why is it the colour of pepto?” </p><p>Eve gagged at that comment and turned around, marching toward the city. “We should hurry along, Zuke! You said you had somewhere else to be!” She snapped back before he stumbled after her. </p><p>“I di-” Zuke paused. “I did!”</p><p>--- Then </p><p>Mayday held up one of Ellie’s little gator paws and one of her own hands. “See Zuke, you are outvoted by the council of good decisions and ideas!” Mayday pointed Ellie at Zuke’s phone which sat on the table with a single message on it. “Both Mayday and Ellie agree this is shady.”</p><p>Ellie made a noise.</p><p>“Shady AF even.” Mayday held her hand over the phone. “I can delete this message if you want, we can pretend you never got it.” </p><p>“Not necessary.” Zuke said from the couch. “It’s just a text from, Eve. She wants to talk to me about something.” Mayday placed Ellie on the floor and the little gator scampered off. </p><p>“Is that what it says?” Mayday held up the phone. “Are you sure it doesn’t say ‘Zuke please come run to my crazy mansion and miss BBJ’s first concert of the season.” </p><p>Zuke took the phone. “No it says; Dearest Zuke, I write to you with utmost urgency. It is rare that I would ask a favour such as this of anyone but I feel it is only you whom I can ask. Please, at your greatest haste, come to see me. I am in need of help with a current project and know not how long I can last.” </p><p>“...She writes like an old lady from those telenovellas.” Mayday said and Zuke puffed out his cheeks nodding a little at that. “It’s real...verbose. She could just say ‘yo come to the hizzie my guy.” </p><p>“I don’t think she could physically say hizzie or yo.” Zuke rubbed at his chin, no it couldn’t be done. He couldn’t imagine Eve say any of that. </p><p>“Fo rizzie?” Mayday said and Zuke looked at her. “I’ll stop.” She said smile splitting her face. “It’s just...so weirdly timed.” </p><p>“It might hurt to hear, May. But I guarantee you she has no idea we’re doing a show.” Zuke told her and Mayday clutched her heart, falling back on the couch with a strangled sound. “Unless she’s got a personal invite or it’s in her planner Eve doesn’t know we have a gig.” </p><p>“You didn’t invite her!?” Mayday sat aghast. “Invite everyone! I invited everybody I know to this thing! I even invited Neon J!”</p><p>“...Did he say yes?” Zuke asked and Mayday nodded, head almost spinglike. “Wow...this social media thing remains a big hurdle.” Zuke moved to collect his sticks from the wall. “I still gotta do this, you know?” </p><p>Mayday wanted to say something, anything about how he doesn’t and shouldn’t and no. But all that died on the way out, she could still recall the utterly unreal circumstances when they fought Eve. All of space turned against her, vast impossible locations unfurling from nowhere and being attacked by the very walls themselves. After all that, struggling through madness Zuke and Eve spoke about their lives from college. </p><p>Some incidents she had no way of learning more about and prying wouldn’t have felt right. They had something once, clearly he was integral to her and Zuke would often admit his brother and Eve both helped him find his feet creatively. </p><p>“Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.” Mayday groaned and pointed to the ladder out of their sewer hideout. “Fine! You go help her...I dunno learn to text or whatever issue she has. But if you’re not back for three I am gonna come over there!” Mayday wielded her presence like a club. </p><p>“Of course you have my full permission to come grab me if I’m not back for three.” Zuke began to scale the ladder. “Thanks, May.” </p><p>“Blah.” Mayday waved at him to get going.</p><p>---Now</p><p>“What time is,” Zuke slapped at his pockets for his phone but couldn’t find it, he turned to look back at the ocean in the distance. “Oooh no.” He muttered an Eve turned to look at him. </p><p>“Zuke?”</p><p>“I think I lost my phone in the ocean.” Zuke turned to look at Eve. “Do you...have a cell phone, you must right?” </p><p>“Not on me.” Eve said, shrugging her shoulders. She wore a simple pair of blue jeans and a simple tan shirt. “I’m afraid I left it behind.” </p><p>“Ugh,” Zuke shuddered against the chill he felt settling in his bones, “great. Cold and no way to tell the time.” He groaned. “Can I also...ask why you...look like...you did?” </p><p>Even paused, they’d been walking past rows and rows of empty houses for a while now. Save for Zuke’s teeth and their feet on the cobbles they’d been quiet. “I suppose it feels right, for how I’m feeling. There’s a juvenile sort of essence to all of this. This problem and this solution, seems this is a reflection of that.” </p><p>“I’ve never...seen this part of your gallery before.” Zuke said as he watched the hands sway slowly in the distant sea. “An interactive exhibit like this is sure to turn heads, how did you...set it up?” He asked and Eve looked at him as if baffled. “Eve?” </p><p>“Zuke...you may have experienced some shock.” Eve said moving to his side and resting a hand on his shoulders. She could feel him shivering and held him closer, it wasn’t much but it was more warmth. He felt himself lean into it some as Eve guided him to a low wall where they sat. </p><p>“I...think I must.” He shuddered. “The cold an-” there was a loud shattering sound and Zuke sat up. Eve had kicked in the door of one of the white houses and entered casually.Zuke looked up and down the street slowly as if expecting someone to show up. </p><p>“It’s...not quite a towel.” Eve shouted from within before returning with a blanket. “But I think it should suffice!” She quickly bundled Zuke up, throwing the blanket around his shoulders and squeezing him tight.Then tighter as more arms blossomed from her back. “I’m sorry, Zuke.” She told him as she held him. </p><p>“I..umm...nothing to be sorry about.” Zuke said but Eve groaned, he felt her rest her chin on the top of his head through the blanket. </p><p>“But you’re only here because of my selfish desires.” She let out a low breath and watched the sea. Hands moving, she nudged Zuke to look. Out there in the endless pink there was what looked like some sort of vessel. </p><p>“What is that?” Zuke asked looking at it, unsure it could be real. He stood up to get closer and have a better chance at picking out the details. A vessel with sails made of stretched taut canvas, a striking figure emblazoned across the surface. Surrounded by many staring eyes, which as the sail rippled and moved would blink and the figure on the canvas would dance. </p><p>As the ship drew closer and closer the hands move, from the tips of fingers and balled up fists came fire. Great horrifying gouts of it that erased the ship. There was too many attacks to avoid, just a massacre. There wasn’t even driftwood. </p><p>“Neon J once said something about combat.” Eve told Zuke tugging on the blanket and moving him back to the wall to sit down against it. She would move the blanket as she spoke, trying to dry him absently.  “He said something like; no plan survives first contact with the enemy.” </p><p>“That...sounds like Neon J.” Zuke said frankly. “A lot of people talk to Neon J…”</p><p>“See I don’t understand too much about combat but...creation is something I understand. I think it’s the same thing.” Eve’s arms seemed to bustle the blanket around Zuke and dry him with absent aggression as she spoke. “An idea can become anything, it can be a simple notion or it can become a dangerous weapon. Everything before it was, was simply an idea.” </p><p>“No idea survives first contact with the artist.” Eve went on and Zuke listened to her, the surety in her voice. “Be it because the artist lacks skill, confidence or the tools. An idea is shaped by the artist it appears in. They have to break it down, communicate it to their audience. To have their idea or their vision seen and understood is the hope of an artist.”</p><p>Eve takes a slow breath and Zuke’s head is tilted to look up at her. Was she...always taller than him? Probably right?  “I understand.” Zuke said slowly. “Ideas are to the creator inherently perfect but translating them to our chosen medium at times can seem...scary.” He feels it’s not drastic enough a word but Eve nods. “What are we...am I looking at Eve? Ideas mauled beyond recognition by clumsy hands?”</p><p>“No.” Eve tells him. “A fair and correct interpretation but...what if it was...the other way.” Eve pulls the blanket from Zuke and tosses the sodden rag behind her. He’s not all the way dry but his teeth aren’t doing maracas impressions. </p><p>Eve swallowed before speaking further. “Every artist has their doubts, their worries and their fears when it comes to their ideas. Writers who’ve never written a single page lament their inability to make it perfect and so never create. Musicians who cannot catch the tune that haunts their nights and so fear playing. Painters daunted by the works that already exist and so why bother?” She shakes her head. “What if your ideas start to feel...so big that you can’t get them out? That they threaten you?”</p><p>“Eve,” Zuke’s voice was soft, “of every artist in every medium I have ever known. The idea of something being too big for you is impossible. Your shows are beyond electric, the things you do and the sounds you make,” he lets out a little breath, “blow my mind. Have always blown my mind.” </p><p>“Even still, Zuke thank you.” She said. “There’s a worry...in me recently it’s what I called you over to help me with.” She watched Zuke’s face go pale. “Zuke?”</p><p>“Oh…” He looked at Eve and swallowed. “I...Eve….can I...ask you a question?” He looked nervous now, gazing up at her soft green eyes and felt something rather unreal in the back of his mind.</p><p>--- Then</p><p>In the middle of the room was a blank canvas, a single dot in the center. Eve stood at his back as he looked at it. “Is it...a new minimalism phase?” Zuke leaned in toward the dot. “Maybe you’re trying some of that ultra-dense art, where it’s layers of micro drawings to create a singular image.” </p><p>“No.” Eve shot that down. “It’s a dot. It’s a single dot and that’s all it is Zuke.” She scowled at it. “One dot, one tiny dot...and it’s taken a lot out of me to get even that.” </p><p>“So….art block?” Zuke said with a nod. “It happens, Eve. Sucks but sometimes there’s a block or a brick or whatever that stops the pipe.” </p><p>“I am not a woman of pipes and stoppages, Zuke! I am a boundless creative dynamo! I am an unending explosion of ideas and wonders! I attack empty pages and devour blank canvases.” She raised her hands over her head and stormed across the room to a lever. Once pulled the painting that sat in the middle of the room was lifted out of view on a long chain. </p><p>“Huh.” Zuke watched it go. “That’s neat, a little punishment room for bad paintings.” He muttered with a laugh. He watched Eve as she threw herself into a big chair, shaped like an open palm. Resting her head against a pillowed index finger and bringing her legs up beside her. “Wow that bad?”</p><p>“Nothing new in weeks. No music, no art, no sculptures it’s all….locked behind a door.” Eve rubbed at her temple.” It’s why I wanted your opinion on this Zuke. You have struggled with creativity and drive countless times.” </p><p>She said this very matter of factly and he couldn’t help but nod his head to one side. “This is one of those rude to say things, Eve.”</p><p>“I’m sorry! I’m frazzled.” She threw up her hands, all of them, even the length of the wall, dozens of ornamental arms raised skyway for a moment. “I have not had...one of these moments. Creating is simply what I am here to do and the notion it can stop is an ugly one to me. How have you alleviated this?” </p><p>Zuke stuffed his hands in his pockets and considered. “Umm going for walks, listening to some music that inspires me and sometimes I just make some food and veg out.” He said leaning over the thumb of the hand to look at Eve.</p><p>“...I have done some of that. Does it have to be your food to cure this issue? I’ve not had anything you’ve made since college.” She asked earnestly and Zuke laughed at that. Eve sat up and her eyes narrowed. “What is funny, Zuke?”</p><p>“No. No, any food. I think if I had the only snacks to cure artist block I’d be like….forty to fifty times bigger than NSR ever was.” Zuke couldn’t help entertain the notion of selling cookies to the many starving artists to give them the clear head for their next big break. It wasn't a bad idea. </p><p>“I was hoping it had to be yours.” Eve folded her arms and flopping back.”I’ve done those things and nothing has changed.” Eve pursed her lips and shook her head. “I’ve a notion of a way to fix this but it’s...well your friend would like it. It’s rather brute force.” Eve said. </p><p>“Sometimes forcing yourself to work does it,” Zuke agreed, “what were you thinking?” </p><p>Eve took in a slow breath and sat back up meeting Zuke’s gaze. “The lack of physicality to this issue is normally a thing that cannot be dealt with.” She let out a slow breath. “I believe that I can deal with it thanks to my powers.”</p><p>“Wh..what like make an ACTUAL artists block?” Zuke knew Eve’s powers were...well he hadn’t ever thought of something she couldn’t do. She could change space around her, transform herself at will and...probably a lot more that he couldn’t really understand. Knowing her was like knowing a genuine super-hero or something like that.</p><p>“I believe it could be done but... “She reached out a hand to Zuke. “It would...maybe make the issue worse. This is an idea right now but to make it reality would mean literally cutting off my ability to create.” </p><p>“Eve that’s really bad.” Zuke told her flatly and she looked away. “As bad as this feels it’s not gonna last forever. Just feel like it is.” Zuke picked his words. “You’re strong Eve, I told you that but this is a very...big risk.” </p><p>“That’s why I needed help.” She grabbed hold of his hand. “Zuke you and I, we can work as a team, I know it was a long time ago and we can’t...have that exact thing back.” She spoke and Zuke had to admit it probably hurt to say that. “But I trust you more than I can most other people.” Her grip on his hands grew tighter. “I do not know for certain if I can do it alone but I think...with help it could be done.” </p><p>“Eve it’s….I don’t want to be responsible for you losing the ability to create.” He said frankly. “It’s not something I’d want for anybody let alone…” He nodded at her and the world around her, filled with her flourishes and creations. </p><p>“It hurts Zuke, if I could make it go away faster I’d take the risk...but not alone.” She couldn’t meet his gaze. “Not alone again.” </p><p>Zuke saw she was still clinging to his hand, knuckles tight. He let out a slow breath he didn’t realize he was holding in. “It’s...I don’t think it’s a good idea, Nadia.” He used her real name. “But it hurts you doesn’t it? It’s just something I won’t understand but I can’t exactly leave you hurting.” </p><p>Her features seemed softer as she sat up and looked at him. </p><p>“So umm...how do we do this?” He asked as she reached out to him. Several arms slid down his cheek or...just one, there was just one there. It felt like fire against his skin, heat rose quickly. It was dating in college all over again, where did you put your hands? What did you say to girls? Don’t listen to a WORD West says!. The room seemed to fall away as she leaned toward him filling his vision. The grip on his hands grew tighter, too tight almost. </p><p>“We’re already moving.” She told him. “Now...open your mind, sink into me and- dive.” She spoke and the world slowly seemed to vanish. It was just Eve towering over him, her hands easily growing to smother his entire arms up to the elbow. Her eyes were the entire world as far as he was concerned, vast cuts of jade that closed slowly. Then she fell upon him. </p><p>Her body wilted then it seemed as if to slide apart before a great weight of water smothered him, knocking him from his feet. He was scrambling, hands desperate to grab hold of anything else. But no it was just more water, waves growing and crashing forcing him down. Pushing to the surface was impossible, anytime he managed he was forced back down into the waves. Dragged deeper and deeper. </p><p>Caught in a twisting spiral be felt himself pulled down into the depths, the light above a distant impossible memory. Within the room itself the waves evaporated, slowly, sinking, sloshing from side to side until with a sound like a gasp there was no water. Just Eve, sat in the middle of the room furniture scattered around her. </p><p>A deep thud in her chest.</p><p>---Now</p><p>“Yes Zuke?” Eve asked as he stared up at her and then stood up. Pink water, white buildings, white sand, pink blanket and...he braced himself against a wall and then turned around to look at Eve. </p><p>Slowly sliding down it. “Eve….” He clasped his hands and licked his lips, suddenly they felt very dry. “I’m….gonna ask a question I never ever in my entire life thought I’d have to ask another person.” </p><p>“Okay.” Eve nodded slowly.</p><p>“Eve….did you eat me?” Zuke looked up at Eve who, upsettingly, did not say no right away. She pursed her lips and let out a quiet sound. “Eve!?”</p><p>“I’m thinking.” Eve said and Zuke fell flat on his side.</p><p>“I know I said a bite to eat helps with art block and stuff but-” Zuke rambled to himself as Eve coughed to get his attention.</p><p> “No. I did not eat you, Zuke.” Eve went on and Zuke wasn’t as comforted by that as he thought he would be. “I have merely subsumed you.” </p><p>“....That sounds a lot like consume...which I’m pretty sure means eat.” Zuke said rolling onto his back. Was this, did he do something to deserve this? Do other people have ex’s like this? West had never had this happen, sure one tried to cut off his hand and sell it on online but he was sure...that of the two brothers he now had THE WILDER girlfriend story.</p><p>“I did not eat you, Zuke!” Eve snapped back. “You are...yourself but you are..simply yourself within me.” She said. “Were you...eaten you’d not be you, you would be part of me. There is a demonstrable difference.” </p><p>“I mean….Yeah, I guess when you put it that way.” Zuke tried to sit up, now wary of every surface and everything around him. “I...oh this is a lot to take in.” </p><p>“Take your time, Zuke.” Eve sat beside him and he bristled looking at her, as if for the first time. </p><p>“How are...you...here?” He asked, looking around. </p><p>“I am here.” She told him and he accepted that would have to be an answer. “It’s rather hard to find a place I am not here…” She let out a groan. “I am sorry, Zuke I should have been more...clear with you.” </p><p>“Clarity would have been great.” Zuke agreed. “But...I mean...I’m here...now.” He said again, trying to keep saying that. “Some...where...inside you.” He looked at Eve. “I’m really not sure all this fits.” </p><p>“Zuke the idea my insides have ever been euclidian in nature is a stunted view.” Eve took a slow deep breath, arms growing from her back and arranged about her. “I’ve always considered that everyone has within them an infinite potential...a Withinfinite if you like.” </p><p>“Awesome album name.” Zuke said and she giggled at that, nudging him. </p><p>“It is where we store our daydreams, our ideas and even our nightmares. We all have this vast repository of wonders and treasure within us all. Where we fish up our ideas and hopes from. It is where the story of our lives is writ in bold and everything that makes me myself and you yourself comes from.” She leaned back and looked to the cloudy skies. “I felt close to mine all my life.” </p><p>Zuke swallowed slowly. “Wow that’s….some interesting ideas. I guess I should feel pretty lucky to see it, even this part.” He wasn’t sure how to respond really. It felt like an Eve-idea. Something big and heady that she’d turned into a precious stone in her own eye but he couldn’t grab it fully. The idea of a world within a person that’s all of their accumulated...them built up in it. That’s a thing. </p><p>“You’ve been a part of mine for a long time, Zuke.” She told him. “Our experiences, our time together, you are an indelible part of me.” She leaned against him. “I suppose it’s what made the idea of...opening the doors for you so easy.” </p><p>“Yeah…Ditto. If I had one of those….Withinfinite things” Zuke said. </p><p>“You do.” Eve said that in much the same way you’d confirm gravity. Zuke nodded and looked at himself, not sure how to process that but deal with it later.</p><p>“I umm...sorry for accusing you of eating me.” Zuke laughed a little at that though more for himself. </p><p>“I mean…” Eve sunk down into herself some. “I can...kinda see the point.” She said through clenched teeth. “I always liked your cooking in college.” She said. “If you tasted half as good as your cooking it might have happened sooner.” </p><p>“Yeah…..” Zuke shook his head and stood up, slapping at his pants. “Just don’t tell me I taste like chicken.” He held out a hand and pulled her up. </p><p>“Oh not even a little.” Eve said. “Much tastier.” She made a little sound like a burp and walked past him.</p><p>“DON’T JOKE ABOUT IT!” Zuke said. “I’m accepting the situation but it ain’t funny!” He saw her smile back at him and he broke. He laughed, she laughed and it was the only thing he could do not to go mad at how absurd it is. </p><p>“Wait….you….can get me...out right?” Zuke said looking at her. “Like not in a gross way!”</p><p>“Zuke!” She snapped at him, going slightly red in the face. “Don’t be vile! I’m sure I can...once...we...solve the issue.” </p><p>“Eve.” Zuke moved to her side. “The artist block thing...you made it real right?” He asked and she nodded. “...Do...do you have no idea how to get me out?” He asked and she smiled at him, nervously, rubbing at her arm. </p><p>“Ha ha...well…” </p><p>“Oh my god Mayday is gonna kill me.” He looked at Eve. “Oh she’s gonna kill you. Oh you’re so boned.” Zuke looked horrified. “Eve you have to find out what time it is cause Mayday told me at 3 she was gonna come get me.” He waved a hand. “Can you do things...here...and there?” </p><p>“Not very well at the same time.” Eve replied. “You should continue, I have a feeling what we’re looking for is...up ahead.” She gazed up the spiralling streets of samey buildings. “I shall investigate the without.” </p><p>“...That one is not as cool. Don’t call it that.” Zuke said and Eve stood still, stock still, total stillness. Zuke waved a hand in front of her face and found that she was now a mannequin statuette. “Oh...so I...guess I gotta…” he gingerly slid his arms around the waist of the mannequin and picked it up. “Oh today is such a pain” </p><p>He started walking up the street, it seemed never to end just to twist eternally upward. A steady but constant incline. “You couldn’t put the no art box at the bottom could ya? Noooo...probably not thematically appropriate to the context of the incident.” </p><p>---</p><p>Eve opened her eyes and stood up, legs feeling heavy. Sitting down cross legged was a bad idea, it was an inelegant gait that carried her out into the hallway. Where she moved to find a clock. She’d attempted to do away with clocks during her recent artistic drought. Gazing at it and feeling years pass as she kept returning to the empty canvas only to find it had been ten minutes. </p><p>A horrible feeling she would be better off without. As she moved she stopped in front of a mirror and looked at herself. Tilted this way and that, leaning to one side and back. She still looked like Eve ought to look, as far as she was concerned. Zuke’s...bad observation had her worried their situation might have changed her. But no, no alterations and no change.</p><p>Silly thoughts, very silly. Nothing to worry about, just the sort of thing only Zuke would ever think of or consider. The only clock she could find was in the main foyer of the building. It was a grand old contraption and the ticking sounds could drive you to madness. </p><p>3:15</p><p>“Hmm.” Eve said to herself. “That might be an issue.” Eve wanted to do something when the door cracked open. </p><p>“ZUKE!” Mayday stood in the doorway. </p><p>“Mayday.” Eve said. “You owe me a new door!” She pointed to the splintered remains that now littered the floor. Mayday for her part slid over to them awkwardly and lifted the busted up door. Pushing it gingerly back into place. </p><p>“It’s fine.” Mayday said quietly. “Where is Zuke!? We have a concert in an hour and a half and we have to get there, now.” She looked around. “Zuuuuuuuuuuke!” </p><p>“Zuke is...in the middle of something.” She disliked it the minute she said it. “Can...Mayday can you sit down for a moment?” Eve gestured to a pair of hand seats. “I...have something to explain.”</p><p>“I dunno, I’ve not really got-”</p><p>“You will have to hear me out. I will be as quick and simple as I can.” Eve said and Mayday’s eyes narrowed. </p><p>“Simple, huh?” Mayday rattled off but sat herself down arms folded over her chest, sliding awkwardly on the seat. Eve sat down in the other seat and started to explain. Mayday to her immense credit sat there and listened. Nodded along. Waited for Eve to explain everything, down to the last detail and then once it was done she stood up.</p><p>Mayday clasped her hands, with her middle and index fingers pressed together. She tapped them against her lips a couple of times. Then turned to face Eve and pointed at her. </p><p>“So….you ate Zuke.” </p><p>Eve put her face in her hands. “Oh my god.” </p><p>“Nuh uh!” Mayday grabbed Eve by the shoulders and shook her. “Nuh uh! You don’t oh my god me!” She snarled. “You ate my buddy, my drummer and might have capsized our concert! You better upchuck my guy.”</p><p>“That’s vile.” Eve said aghast. “I can’t do that and wouldn’t do that.” She shuddered. “It doesn’t work that way.” Eve was grabbed, Mayday’s fingers digging into her jaw as she pulled down on Eve’s mouth.</p><p>“Zuke! BUDDY can you hear me!?” She asked and waited for a reply.</p><p>“Thishishscoopid.” Eve said shoving Mayday back. “He isn’t, that doesn’t….” She took a slow breath. “He can’t hear you!” She seethed. </p><p>“Okay….I’m gonna find a big saw-”</p><p>“THAT will also not work!” Eve cried out. “I will also CALL THE POLICE.” She snapped.</p><p>“I’ll tell them you ate my badmate!” Mayday cried back. “We can both go to jail forever!”</p><p>“They will not believe you and Mayday it's been barely six months since you and Zuke almost destroyed the city.” Eve said, causing Mayday to blow a raspberry. </p><p>“Like anyone remembers that.” Mayday laughed  “Jerk move, that would fail.” She said and groaned. “Ughhh I can’t believe this is happening.” </p><p>“He wasn’t much happier…” Eve confessed. “We’re working on fixing it...right now.” She pointed to herself. “I can help you...or I can help him is the thing. Can’t do both.” </p><p>“Is it like chewing gum and walking or something?” Mayday groaned. “Well Bunk Bed Junction has never missed a single concert and we can’t start now. So….Zuke is helping you with your thing. You caused this.” </p><p>“I..did yes.” Eve bowed her head. “I am very sorry for the current situation, it was careless of me and -”</p><p>“Hey whatever.” Mayday said quickly. “Zuke agreed and he’s a hard guy to dissuade. I swear he’d help everybody in the world if he could.” She shook her head. “What a pain, a drummer who isn’t an animal and helps old ladies cross the street.”</p><p>“He’s certainly not what you’d expect on drums.” Eve agreed. “If there’s anyway I can help I-” </p><p>“Yup!” Mayday tossed something to Eve who quickly caught hold of it. “First you can help me set up the instruments and stuff at the gig, cause it’s gonna be tight. Ellie doesn’t have her lighting certification so she can’t help yet.”</p><p>“....The alligator?”</p><p>“Second if by some horrible chance Zuke is not here...well…” Mayday grinned and held up the sticks in Eve’s hands. “You are what you eat.” Drum sticks. </p><p>“...Oh dear.” Eve said flatly horrified at the implements in her hands. That whole upchuck thing suddenly sounded like a much better idea.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Eve and Mayday set up for a concert that one of them is utterly dreading. Meanwhile Zuke considers the merits of some of the oldest art advice about theft.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Eve had always had an interest in wires. When it came to music especially, for certain instruments wires were essential. They got the sound out as it were, they were the connective tissue between artist, instrument and amplification. There was a project in there, she was sure of it. But not for right now. </p><p>“I’m surprised ya know how to do all this.” Mayday was sprinting around, rolls of duct tape fitted over her arms. As she went she would tear free strips and tape down the trailing wires, shoving them out of the way on the stage. “I figured you had like people,” she said the word people in a faux English accent, pinkies raised on both hands, “for this sort of thing.” </p><p>“I do.” Eve responded. “But I was also in a band and also know the wonder of setting up for a gig.” She was down on her knees shoving a set of cables into the corner of the stage. “I remember having the gall to set up stage props as well,” she laughed, “oh once Zuke and I had to arrive three hours early to assemble a vast planetary array so that I could sit in the middle as the sun.” </p><p>She turned to face Mayday, a smile on her face. “Zuke of course being green and blue got to be Earth. It was...an experience as much as it was a concert.” She noticed the look that Mayday was giving her, not quite annoyance but absolutely a second cousin to it. “Sorry…” Eve turned and went back to laying out wire.</p><p>The only sound for a few moments was the ripping of tape. It was going decently well until then, Eve had felt. Mayday was hard to communicate with, she didn’t...accept things in the same way Zuke could. He’d tilt his head and follow along whereas Mayday seemed certain to plough on ahead at all times. Eve could very much accept that Mayday had every right to be displeased with her. </p><p>After all she’d...borrowed Zuke without asking. She’d like to say that if she knew he was busy she’d have waited but that would be a lie. Eve wasn’t aware of the concert until Zuke mentioned it, true but by the same virtue that hadn’t altered her plan at all. She had an issue and Zuke had agreed to help her fix it, they had simply lost track of time. </p><p>“I’m-”</p><p>The door to the venue popped open as a bright blue alligator waddled in, carrying on it’s back several boxes and a large black case. Eve watched as the creature waddled over to a table and with a few shakes deposited the boxes. </p><p>“Nice job, Ellie!” Mayday said giving the gator a thumbs up. “This is nearly everything, one more run and I think you’re gold.” She began to move through the boxes when the gator slapped it’s tail on the ground. “Oooh does someone want a treat?” Mayday coo’d. “A treat?”</p><p>The gator stomped it’s stubby limbs in anticipation and from a pocket Mayday removed a thin bar of something. “You’re lucky Zuke got eaten or he’d be so mad at you getting treats.” Mayday said and Eve let her head thump against the nearest solid surface.</p><p>“I didn’t. Eat. Zuke.” Eve said for easily the hundredth time. “He is simply….within me.” She knew Mayday wouldn’t get it, couldn’t get it. Zuke while bewildered had absolutely understood their current situation. As she knew he would. This girl was just being vile and base to make her feel worse than she already did. </p><p>“Oh dang.” Mayday said. “I wonder how he got there, super easy thing to have happen.” She drawled, throwing the bar to Ellie who snapped it up gladly. “I mean I know I end up within all kindsa people.” </p><p>“It’s…” Eve held up her hands. “I have tried, I have explained, you have failed to understand the nature of what occurred.” Eve stood up, swatting the dust from her pants. She’d opted to go casual for this possible gig. Sure she was still a towering two tone lady who you could see on billboards all over the city. But she’d opted for clothing that was less visual warfare and more lazy sunday. </p><p>“No, I got a hand on it.” Mayday replied. “I had a partner and a drummer. He went to see you. Now he’s,” she gestured at Eve walking a quick circuit around her to make sure she got everything covered, “in there somewhere.” </p><p>“Yes.” Eve nodded. “But he was not eaten.” </p><p>“Like I get you can do the trippy stuff, the DIVA REALM,” Mayday waved her arms around, fingers waggling, “ and jump around through paintings but like.” She lightly smacked Eve in the stomach with the back of her hand. “How does a whole Zuke go in there?” </p><p>“I am a woman of depth and multitudes.” Eve said.</p><p>“Like the local pool?” Mayday said and Eve bit down on her lips, swallowing down a scream and the urge to throttle. Eve turned around and was ready to say something when she heard an engine start. She turned to see the van drive off, she pointed toward it. </p><p>“The….alligator can drive a car?” She said incredulously.</p><p>“Yeah!” Mayday said quickly. “Also a helicopter.” She said and Eve made a sound. “No for real, that whole end of the city thing with the helicopter was her.” </p><p>“No.” Eve was absolutely blown away. “How does she?”</p><p>“WE dunno!” Mayday said, throwing her hands up. “She has lil licenses too, when she comes back I’ll show you.” </p><p>“You will have to, I do not believe it.” Eve said as Mayday laughed. The pair moved over to the dropped off contents. A few more bits and pieces but the big draws were the long black case and a small box. “Is...that?” Eve pointed at the case and Mayday popped it open. </p><p>“Tatiana’s guitar.” Mayday said lifting the sleek black beast from the box. It was a work of art, Eve had said as much anytime she saw it. The body of the guitar gave off a faint heat that Eve could feel even a few feet away from it. Mayday slid her finger along the strings. “I’ll tell ya she must have calluses on top of calluses. The strings on this thing are heavy.” She plays a chord and both of them can feel it in their cores. </p><p>“All the history.” Eve says without thinking. “That’s an instrument that’s been places, done things...it’s almost alive.” She reaches out to touch it but thinks better. </p><p>“You wanna hold it?” Mayday asks holding it to her but Eve takes a step back. “It don’t bite, well,” she looks at her fingers and snickers, “it chews a lil…” She wiggled her fingers, faint lines across her gloved hand and exposed fingers tell the story. </p><p>“Her strings are much heavier.” Eve agreed. “You can play it?” She asked and Mayday looked at her, a smirk on her face as she decided to show off...just a little bit. She thumbed on an amp and hooked herself in.</p><p>She chokes down on the neck on the guitar, just above the body. The almost flying v shape makes it a simple grip, no need to overhand the strap guard against her body. She bring down her other hand and that black behemoth wails, out of those amps pour a great thunderous belt. She seems to let go of the guitar, hands swap position, the choke flies the length of the neck and draws out a climbing pitching of raw sound and once she reaches the apex her other hand throttles down just above that body again. Fingers go wild as she moves her hands down the guitar’s sleek black surface. </p><p>The roar of the amps, the fury of that sound and the room feels like a furnace all at once. Eve didn’ know when she had started to cling to one of the amps but she had. Feeling all that sound and all that fury shred through her was unlike anything else.</p><p>Mayday plucked those strings, faster and faster her hands growing closer on the neck as that sound got as fast as it did hard. Heavier strings meant nothing, she’d overcome that. The raw speed made it seem like her hands were a blur, they were smoke and the guitar was fire. Play fast, play hard but play right or it’ll burn you right down to the bone. </p><p>Mayday saw the look on Eve’s face and she gave a quick bow, still playing. With each bow she jerked the whammy bar to give a mad growl from the amps, distorted animalistic sound that shoved you back in your seats. All before raising the instrument up, behind her head and damn near ripping the bar off with one last belt. </p><p>Once the sound was gone Eve could hear herself breathing heavy. </p><p>“I can play.” Mayday told her with a grin. “This thing gave me sausage fingers for a month straight but now me and it get along real sweet.” She gave the black sleek body a pat. Running her finger against those strings a low hiss of smoke seeme to rise up. “For the most part…” </p><p>“My word.” Eve said. Zuke clearly still had an ear for music, didn’t he? Pedestrian girl might not understand art but music,oh she could teach a class. “Incredible.” She said again and Mayday stood up tall. </p><p>“Yeah, I’m more than a pretty face.” Mayday grinned, a big stupid toothy smile. “So you ever play drums?” </p><p>“....I…” Eve briefly recalled throwing Zuke’s drums out the window one night, screaming that it was the best sound they’d ever made. “Have...dabbled.”  </p><p>“Okay. I was afraid of that.” Mayday said. “So, step one! I will finish the rest of the stage stuff!” Mayday pointed to the stage. “Not much left. While I do that!” She grabbed the box and flipped it open to reveal a stack of records. “BBJ on vinyl baby. You go listen to some tunes, try and find your inner Zuke…” She snorted. “Which might not be hard considering you got the genuine article in ya too.” </p><p>Eve went a little red on the face and folded her arms over her chest. “That’s not funny.” </p><p>“It’s a little funny.” Mayday held her fingers close together. “You try and sort your thing with him and get him back. But if not maybe...ask him for pointers.” She suggested. “I’m having Ellie bring in a genuine drum set so you can use Zuke’s….NSR ones or an ACTUAL drum set.” Mayday nodded, bias clear and obvious. </p><p>“Thank you, Mayday...for this understanding.” Eve said. </p><p>“Not that I got much choice but no point getting down on it.” Mayday said and Eve supposed that was true. She had no choice. “I’d rather put on a show to the best of what we got than let the audience down. So one way or another we give these people a show.” </p><p>Eve took the records and moved to a little room off to one side. It was for performers only, a tiny room not much to it but a pair of chairs and a large wall length mirror. Eve looked at herself and sighed. She put on some BBJ and sat down. Mellow drums to start with and then the roar of a guitar. She closed her eyes and took a slow breath in. </p><p>The world wasn’t there when she breathed out. There was just her now, enough of her to fill every corner of creation. She sank, she swam, she plummeted down into the depths of herself. Into that vastness she called The Withinfinite. Zuke was right...killer album name. </p><p>The place every idea came from, the place that made Eve what she was. Everybody had one, she was sure of that. It was the place it all came bubbling up from, it was thanks to that place that we gave things meaning. That we bothered to ask why and that we would cultivate our creations. </p><p> </p><p>It was also currently where she had stranded Zuke.</p><p> </p><p>---Within</p><p>Zuke’s shoulders ached, carrying around the mannequin that was Eve. She was with him until she vanished to find out what the time was. He had no idea how long ago that was. She stopped talking and changed into a lifeless doll. He’d been carrying it on his back now wandering the repetitive landscape he found himself in. </p><p>He looked back and was sure the beach and the water was getting further away but no matter how much he walked he wasn’t making progress. He’d marked the ground, scuffng it with his heel (hoping that didn’t upset Eve any).  He walked for about ten minutes and came past the mark again. </p><p>“Oh we’re in trouble here mannequin Eve.” He said to the mannequin slung over his shoulders. “If I was to posit a theory. This Withinfinite, for real that’s an album title you use it or I will,” he chastised the mannequin with a smirk, “this place is...symbolic. You know, layers and meanings. Like you said earlier, the sea is every bit a giver as it is a taker. I think this...city is the same thing.” </p><p>He wiped the sweat from his forehead, it wasn’t warm but he’d been moving non stop. The overcast sky above remained eternally cloudy. “This city with it’s samey buildings and it’s bland uniformity means something doesn’t it?” Zuke got no reply. “Everything usually does.” Zuke went on. “Like you said creation is hard and for you...I imagine it’s like speaking a different language to the rest of us.” </p><p>“You might see most of us like this, uniform creations stacked up forever and ever with no defining character.” Zuke coughed. “I don’t like assuming the worst of you but...it sounds right, doesn’t it?”</p><p>“It’s a valid assessment.” </p><p>Zuke stopped moving and turned to the mannequin on his back. It was still a mannequin.  </p><p>“Over here.” He heard and turned again to find Nadia...Eve standing by one of the houses. “Why are you carrying around that mannequin of me?” She asked coming over. Zuke quickly, but gently, set it down. </p><p>“I thought it was you.” </p><p>“Zuke,” she held her arms out, “it’s all me. The floor, the sea, the air you’re breathing. All me.” She went on. </p><p>“Well...now I feel dumb.” Zuke scratched the back of his head. “I think this place...is...part of your block or what it’s become. Unless you know what it looks like or…?”</p><p>“No.” Eve shook her head. “I have no idea what shape or form it’ll take.” She looked down at Zuke and at the buildings around them both. “Your idea isn’t incorrect. I look down on artists, performers and the like. It’s shallow but true,” she leaned against the building and Zuke moved to join her, “I always went on about elevating people. Dragging them upward with me. It’s a bad idea, that you can twist and mould people….that you have to elevate them to be like you.”</p><p> </p><p>She looks at him as she says that. She can’t keep it up and tears away from looking at him. “It’s harmful for all parties involved.” She goes on, Zuke rests a hand on her shoulder and she leans into it. “I was bad to you, Zuke. I was awful to my district. None of them approached the standard I had hoped for so I left them in the dark. You….well...we know what I did to you.”</p><p>Zuke did. He still can’t look at fireplaces without getting the shivers. He wasn’t going to let her ache alone. “You’ve changed, it might not feel like it but acknowledging that means you have. We both have, for the better.” He squeezed her shoulder gently. “We can’t go back but we shouldn’t want to. I ran away at the first chance and I never tried to fight back, against you or West or...anybody.” </p><p>After getting his degree he really did just drop off the face of the world. He went to venues, saw places and let himself dissolve into the music scene. It wasn’t until he heard some young thing fretting on a guitar that he wanted to get back into a band proper. </p><p>“Your...partner.” Eve said. “I heard her play for the first time today, she’s,” Eve let out a low laugh, “she’s just an inferno in size six shoes isn’t she?” </p><p>“May? Oh yeah, she’s running hot at all hours of the day. Girl can’t even hold still in her sleep. It’s why she’s bottom bunk...she would fall out of top bunk.” Zuke said and Eve laughed, a low snort at the start into a proper laugh. “How ummm is she?”</p><p>“She….keeps saying I ate you.” Eve muttered, rubbing at her forehead. Zuke laughed at that resting his back against Eve’s. “It’s not funny!” She replied. “I didn’t….do that.” </p><p>“I mean,” Zuke shrugged his shoulders, “you didn’t. I agree but...I mean I am apparently where I am. It’s fine.”</p><p>“She just asks….really stupid things. Did I have two big slices of bread? Did I use mustard? Did Zuke taste like chicken!?” She went on.</p><p>“Make sure you tell her that last one is a no.” Zuke said pointedly. “She’s just...trying to get it in her own way. Like you said, translating ideas is an artist's struggle, the audience isn’t obligated to understand you much as that sucks.” </p><p>“It does.” Eve said. “It’s a horrible thing. You can spend forever on something, you can do everything possible to make a point as bluntly as you can and people will still fail to grab hold. I think of authors who discover people love the antagonist and ignore their foibles.” Eve drew herself up, breathing slowly. </p><p>“So...I think,” Zuke went on, “if we want to...get moving here we need to...change things.” Zuke rolled up his sleeves. “These buildings are the...artists that feel the same to you right? Maybe. We have to….elevate one of them. Make it stand out, beautify it as only we can.” </p><p>“Escaping the trappings of your peers is an artist's goal, standing out in any way you can is the hope. There’s comfort in conformity but at the same time failure to express yourself is a death sentence.” Eve nodded her head. “But...how do we do that?” </p><p>“Umm empty your pocket. Wait.” Zuke held up a hand. “You’ve got nothing right? </p><p>She let her hands slap against her hips. “I’m literally the world around you Zuke, I didn’t think to bring more.” </p><p>“You can’t,” he gestured grinding his fist into his palm, “make more? Eve you’ve stuck me in other realities to win Mario Kart races-”</p><p>“The game is inherently unfair!” Eve replied quickly. “If it is HIS kart he should always win!”</p><p>“Focus.” Zuke snapped. “Can you make things? Paints and the like?”</p><p>“Normally I’d say...yes but, with the artist block it’s...foggy. It’s like I’m driving from the backseat. I know I can do more than this but I can’t……” She shook her head. “Recall.” Her hands balled into fists. </p><p>“I got...drumsticks, a stick of gum, a dodopop wrapper and a coupon for a free back rub from May.” Zuke said scratching his head, Eve peered at him and made a low sound. “What?”</p><p>“just..The wrapper.” She said. “I didn’t think you’d bring trash in here.” </p><p>“I mean….” Zuke looked to the ocean. “My phone is...somewhere.” He said and Eve shuddered. “I didn’t mean to...litter.” </p><p>“It’s….a topic for later.” She said wriggling slightly, a phone and garbage and...oooh not a fun thing to think about. Zuke looked down at a blanket on the ground and lifted it up, a smile on his face. </p><p>“Eve!” He said. “There’s stuff in the houses!” He held up the pink blanket as proof. “I think...I think I get it.” </p><p>The look on her face was sudden elation. A connection, like that they were on the same page.</p><p>“I’m with you.” Eve said quickly, she pointed to a random house on the street. “That’s ours. Get everything you can.” She moves toward another house and Zuke mirrors her movements. He opens the door and she kicks it down. </p><p>“...It’s you! It’s unlocked!” </p><p>“It’s a great stress reliever.” Eve said with a grin. “I should have said, you also need to teach me every single thing about drumming.” </p><p>“Why?” Zuke asked leaning around the door. </p><p>“According to, Mayday….if I cannot upchuck you. Then I have to play drums for BunkBed Junction.” Eve said this and Zuke nodded a couple of times. He disappeared into the house and a coloured rug shattered through the window. </p><p>“We have rugs!” Zuke called out enthusiastically. </p><p> </p><p>It wasn’t a popular statement by any stretch but Eve and Zuke were aware of an old adage. It was advice that sounded ugly but honestly it came from a good place. A wise man once said; “A good artist copies. A great artist steals.” Now on the surface level this sounds like the kind of advice that lands you in jail or canceled. But shockingly once you swallow the bile you get the idea. </p><p>Innovation is hard in creative endeavours, we’re not inventing new words very often. Instruments have been played for centuries. New genres happen but they share something from the old. Rap music samples classic funk tracks, there’s a whole genre of art based around redoing old pieces and making them new. </p><p>Stealing happens but when you steal right you can reinvent. There’s a movie out there with lions that let’s be real is just Hamlet. Eve and Zuke were, well they’d copy paste a couple bits and pieces into essays and snuggled a thesaurus. What college student hadn’t? </p><p>Sure this was literal but that’s how artists start, that’s how some thrive. Eve and Zuke ransacked the houses the length of the street, ripping down curtains, shredding sheets, shaving rugs and everything else they could do. Then they started making a mess of the one place they hadn’t torn apart. </p><p>That was art, that was starting out wasn’t it? Take what you like, rip it apart and find the parts that tickle your fancy. Then dress yourself up in your gaudiest robe. The emperor might not have new clothes but boy is he wearing the latest trends. </p><p>“It doesn’t...hurt you does it?” Zuke asked as he held a rug in hand. </p><p>“It doesn’t hurt me.” Eve told him before he shredded it. “Thank you for asking though.” She was currently hanging criss crossing curtains across the living room, a canopy of colours. Greens, pinks and whites, the light shines through them into a pattern on the floor. </p><p>“I don’t want to hurt you Eve.” Zuke said it absently it was obvious to him. “Not again.”</p><p>He feels a tightness across his chest as Eve holds him from behind. He stands there frozen for a moment. Feeling her hands clasp in front of him. He leans back a little, enjoys the closeness. </p><p>“I don’t want to hurt you Zuke.” She told him. “Not again.” She squeezes and he rests his hands over his. “Do you...believe I ever did?” </p><p>“No.” Zuke tells her honestly. “It still hurt when it hurt but I don’t think...you wanted to hurt me. I just let you.” He kept twisting the fibers in his hands. “We both wanted something and we both got it for a time.” </p><p>“It just cost us.” She takes a slow deep breath, Zuke tries not to shiver. He’s not been...close to someone like Eve since...Eve. Mayday wasn’t quite the same. She was...heat and fire and closeness seemed natural to her. </p><p>Eve was something else; she was the sea and she dragged you with her everywhere she went. You were at her mercy and she could help or if you let her she could hurt. Maybe she was the stars, maybe she wasn’t some complicated allegory or metaphor she was just...Nadia. </p><p>She was the girl from college he let in and they kept each other warm and sane and safe. Until they didn’t. </p><p>“If you knew I was going to do this,” she said again, “pull you...into me. Deep, deeper than anyone else.” Her grip grows tighter. “Would you have wanted to help me still?” </p><p>“Of course.” He doesn’t hesitate, not for a moment. “You needed me, I told you if that happened again...I’d do better.” He can feel her smiling into the back of his head leaning on him. </p><p>“What if I hurt you?” Eve asked him. “You’re stuck here….trapped inside your ex-girlfriend.” She let out a little sound. He wasn't sure if it was a laugh or a sob. “It’s almost a joke.” </p><p>“Because I don’t thi-.” He stopped. “I know you won’t hurt me again Eve.” He felt sure of that. “Anything in here that...would or could do me harm...you won’t let it.” He said slowly. “It’s not an ideal situation I’m in, sure….but you needed help and I told you that you’d get it. You won’t hurt me.” </p><p>She holds him for a bit and he doesn’t really know what’s going to happen. If something is supposed to happen. She takes a long breath, and pulls away from him. “You’re exactly right, Zuke. I won’t.” She stutters. “I’m sorry I...we’ve got things to do.” </p><p>“We do.” He said silently relieved she’d let go. If she hadn’t done that...he was pretty sure he wouldn’t want her to later. HE looks down at what was supposed to be a little colurful rope of fabric but he’s...pretty much crushed it into a mess. It’s….been a while, hasn’t it? </p><p>He can’t help but hear West in the back of his head, a big booming laugh. A thumbs up, a go get em tiger. He does his best to ignore it, there’s a reason that didn’t work out. Could it though? Not...a thing to think about right now, let that drift out. Focus on...getting out of Eve before you think of getting with Eve.</p><p>They work and Zuke tries, very hard, to explain how exactly to drum. But it’s a touch difficult. The NSR holo-drum makes it easy to demonstrate certain things. They go in shifts, he works and she plays. She works and he plays. It’s more like a bootcamp than anything that’s going to be fully substantive. </p><p>“I’m surprised at all the stuff you’ve experimented with,” Zuke had said as he let out a rapid pitter patter on the glowing cymbals, “you never went for percussion or anything like that.” </p><p>“That was...well your domain.” Eve replied, taking a big step back, holding her fingers out like a frame to capture the look of something. Two shining rocks plucked from the beach dangling from thin strips of fabric twisting and throwing jade light across the room. “I...tried once or twice but it brought back memories. Trying drums again actually led to the rabbit foot sculpture.”</p><p>“Ah ha…” Zuke recalled the statue of a rabbit’s foot. He’d got her one as a little token of luck but she’d taken it as a graven insult. The idea she needs luck to be as good as she was, eventually she made a statue dedicated to the folly of such an idea. A work of art, publicly shown, that others gasped and fawned over but it was literally an insult for one person. </p><p>“It’s not been a productive relationship.” She confessed with a nervous laugh. “Studio work when it came to music always felt better, more clean, I could create an exact sound.” </p><p>She and Zuke had taken the place apart and put it back together covered in a sublime lick of paint. No room was without a dozen splashes of colour, the chalk white that was once the prevailing colour in the room had been combined with dozens of new shades. Glittering rocks from the beach, crossing shades of lights and rugs sacrificed on the altar of taste had produced something that, well it wouldn’t win awards but it looked different. </p><p>“Maybe we have to do umm...more outside?” Zuke said opening the door and then slamming it shut. Turning around to look at Eve. </p><p>“What?” </p><p>“I,” he shook his head and took a step to the side indicating the door, “you should.” </p><p>Eve moved over to the door and opened it. “Oh.” She said tilting her head slightly to the side. “That’s…” Eve was a lady who liked her metaphor and her symbols but...there wasn’t much hidden here. There was a vast black box floating in the air, apparently their little project had cleared the skyline lifting off while they worked. Now it was somewhere very high up, the ocean below was invisible through the thicket of clouds. There was just the great box, the great big massive block of pure earth. </p><p>Carved into the face of it was a mural of a truly bestial looking woman, her arms raised and mouth spewing lightening. A truly monstrous face, wicks of dynamite stuck to her head slowly burning down. </p><p>“It looks like Mayday.” Eve said and Zuke gagged and covered his mouth. “You think so too?” </p><p>“No.” Zuke said, his voice wavering. “The hair a little.” He conceded. “I sort of figured it’d be more artistic...this is very blunt force.”</p><p>“This is a very blunt force moment Zuke.” Eve went on. </p><p>“IS...that why it looks like Mayday?” Zuke said. “You umm said  this whole thing was a lil juvenile and childish and…” He looked away from the massive monstrous face in the distance.</p><p>“I thought only the hair did?” Eve looked back at him, a smile on her face. </p><p>“Don’t change the subject.” Zuke stammered. </p><p>“I underestimated Mayday, but I don’t view her as a creative drought. Hard to...move or overcome perhaps but...not a creative drought.” </p><p>“Impassable and hard to overcome?”</p><p>“Zuke in the time I was with her she asked me over 200 times how I ate you. She drew diagrams, she had sketches, she even said she would pinky promise not to tell anyone if I told her the truth.” Eve fumed. “She is relentless and unyielding.” </p><p>“I can’t lie, she'd love that as an album cover.” Zuke muttered. “I really wish I had my phone.”</p><p>“I do too...I’m really scared if someone calls you.” Eve muttered. “So...that’s...clearly the art block.” She said, pursing her lips. “I just realized something….”</p><p>“What?”</p><p>“There’s no sun.” Eve said flatly. Zuke looked around, squinted and paused. </p><p>“That...might...be an issue.” Zuke put his hand on Eve’s shoulder. “Nothing we can’t….” he turned to find Eve was made of wood. “Oh. That’s….probably not great.” </p><p> </p><p>---</p><p>Eve was pulled out of her meditative stance, arms shaking her and she swatted. “No I was...Mayday?” </p><p>“Heeeeeeeeeey.” Mayday grinned at Eve. “So………….Zuke?” She asked sweetly and Eve shook her head. “So I got a suggestion...I found this big rubber glove.”</p><p>“If you try it...I promise I will bite off whatever you put near me.” Eve told her directly, standing up. “Are we out of time? We’re so close I’m sure of it!”</p><p>“It’s...twenty minutes to curtain, we pushed back a sound check as far as we could.” Mayday told her. “You gotta test the drums and decide if you’re gonna go whole fat or NSR brand. The crowds here and they want rock and roll.” </p><p>“....Oh.” Eve swallowed hard. </p><p>“Let me try...calling Zuke.” Mayday said holding up her phone. “We can like video conference and he can play that way!” She said and Eve grasped her hand. </p><p>“Mayday….I beg of you….do not call Zuke.” Eve said and Mayday looked at her, sincerity on her face. “He lost his phone and-” </p><p>Mayday pressed the button and Eve shuddered, shaking all over. Mayday’s jaw dropped slightly as Eve shook all over again. “Nooooo way.” Mayday said not even attempting to hide her face splitting smile. “Oh my god, for real?” </p><p>“Please.” Eve’s face was red as she felt the full body tremor start up again. “PLEASE….” Eve winced. “Hang up.” </p><p>“The person you have tried to call is unavailable, please leave a message…”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thanks for reading and sticking with this odd meditation on the creative process, the toils of it and the stresses of making stuff.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The curtain rises and the Art Block still dominates the sky. Can Eve hammer out a solo to save the show? Will Zuke escape his strange situation!? Will my views skyrocket now that NEON J SHOWS UP IN PERSON!?</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Eve was laying on her back, her face entirely beet red. Her toes curled and she took a low, shaky breath to steady herself. “Mayday….please….do not...ever….ever do that again.” Eve looked at Mayday who just stood there, mouth agape as if it was the first time she’d ever seen Eve. “What are you-” Eve started to say when Mayday just prodded Eve in the side. </p><p>“Zuke is actually in there.” She said her voice was distant. “Like actually, actually he’s in there.” </p><p>“I said he was.” Eve hissed and Mayday just grabbed herself by the head and clawed at her eyes. </p><p>“Yeah but you speak in weird made up language stuff! I thought it was a metaphor or slimerly.” Mayday said a weird laugh bubbling up. “But no...he’s actually, somehow, inside of you.” </p><p>“It simile...yes.” Eve said. “He is. We’re close to fixing it and very soon we’ll be able to remedy this whole affair.” Eve went on hoping she could get back to Zuke. </p><p>“Just not before...the concert.” Mayday whispered. “Come on, we gotta go to sound checks.” Mayday stood up and Eve watched her go. “Come on, we got a buddy to help set up the drums.” </p><p>Eve slowly got up and followed after her. “I just need more time.” Eve hissed. </p><p>“We don’t have it.” Mayday told her. “We have ten minutes to hook up and then we’re live. I’m sure you’re close but so are the fans.”</p><p>“They can wait.” Eve said through clenched teeth. </p><p>“No.” Mayday told her, a voice like iron. “They don’t wait. They came here for a show, they get a show.” Mayday grabbed Eve by the wrist and dragged her out with her. “BunkBed Junction always gives the fans a show, we can’t always give them a perfect show but we will always give them a show.” </p><p>“But it’s not good, it won’t be what they want.” Eve said trying to dig in her heels, no Mayday was somehow far stronger than any logical sense allowed her to be. </p><p>“They want a show. They get a show.” Mayday rattled. “I’d rather a concert than a cancellation. These people turned up and we owe it to them.”</p><p>“No we don’t! No you don’t! They’re always there, they won’t go away!” Eve looked back at the little green room, she really would rather be there. She walked right into Mayday who turned around to face her. </p><p>“Umm..J!” She yelled out and the screen of Neon J popped around the corner. “I need a hand here!” She called out and he ran over. Neon J, perhaps most bafflingly to Eve, was absolutely decked out in BBJ merch. He had a shirt, a hat- hanging over the edge of the screen- lil keychains...he was fitted out. </p><p>“What can I do for ya?” He asked and Mayday gestured upward. Neon J easily lifted her up to meet Eve at eye level. “That about right?”</p><p>“Yeah.” She said. “You!” She pointed at Eve. “You might think like that but I don’t and Zuke sure don’t. The fans will always be there, they’ll always come back. No they won’t, if you stop, if you give up, if you let them down then they go away! It’s all for them, all the sound and the show is for them as much as it is us.” </p><p>Mayday put her hands on her hips and did her best to glower down at Eve. “I don’t have no fancy art paper that tells people I know what I’m talking about or nothing.” Mayday waved her hands. “What I do have is understanding.” She folded her arms over her chest. “My fans aren’t all great, some were….you know psychos who tried to engineer the downfall of civilization! Others are great! Most others are great! Do they know what every song means or does that matter? No! They showed up to hear music, they showed up to support us and it’s my job to make that happen.”</p><p>“Zuke says that art and music and creation are a dialogue,” Mayday rolled her eyes, “between an artist, their medium and the audience. Without everybody there it’s not a dialogue it’s just shouting into the void and loving the echo. If you got one man in the audience you play to them like it’s one million strong. No excuses, the show must go on.”  </p><p>Eve felt herself wilt just a little under that. She’d been known to let concerts start late and finish early. The art came before the audience to her, that was a fact. The performances were all for the city and to keep the lights on. Her lights specifically. Mayday believed in showing up on time and playing your heart out even if you had one person there. What was the point? What if they didn’t get it? The lyrics go over people’s heads, they can’t understand the mandala and fail to open up. The audience was essential as a powersource but they weren’t there to be anything else. </p><p>“I’m gonna,” Neon J dropped Mayday, “just assume some weirdness is occurring. I got the drums set up if you want to look them over.” Neon J walked slowly, sure he had missed something here but he wasn’t one to stick his nose in where it didn't belong. Especially not after losing it. </p><p>“That’s what I love.” Mayday said looking at the drum set. “Actual real drums none of them fancy holograms. Zuke says you can’t tell but I’m sure you can.” </p><p> </p><p>“Speaking of where is that boy?” Neon J turned his screen this way and that. “He run off cause I’d tell him his haircut wasn’t regulation again? It ain’t. I’d never let one of my troops sidle up to the stage looking like that. One errant spark and fwoosh!” Neon J threw his hands up. “I saw it happen before.” </p><p>“We-”</p><p>“I ate him.” Eve said devoid of anything like feeling, taking her seat behind the drum set. She picked up the sticks, resting across one of the toms. Toms that’s what you called these, wasn’t it? Zuke had a set like this in college, a proper set of drums. She remembers the noise they made flying out the window. </p><p>Best noise they ever made, she’d screamed at the top of her lungs. </p><p>Neon J looked at Mayday who nodded. “Well….” Neon J’s screen flickered briefly as he seemed to search for something, anything appropriate to say in the legions of scenarios he’d experienced. 404. File not found. “That’s certainly a new one.” </p><p>“They’re working it out.” Mayday said absently.</p><p>“You mean she’s working him out, right?” </p><p>“You are both horrible, vile, gremlin people and I wish I could make you explode with my mind.” Eve said tapping the drumsticks across the surface of the drums and feeling the tension. A couple taps on the surroundings of each tom. Middle, high, floor, on that side the snare and on the opposite the cymbal. The big bass drum with the pedal was...different. The digital sticks simulated that sound in the back. Zuke would tap his foot to the rhythm but the momentum of doing it herself sound like a chore. </p><p>“So...Eve is your drummer?” </p><p>“She ate my other one.” Mayday said. “Unless you….know how to drum?” She asked and Neon J held up his hands and shook his screen. </p><p>“No I know how to field strip a firearm, fieldstrip 1010 and work a highly sophisticated semi sentient AI battle tank.” Neon J clasped his hands behind his back. “Only percussion I got good at is the gentle caress of lady recoil.” </p><p>“Sorry after strip and 1010 I kinda just,” Mayday waved a hand in front of her face, “missed the last two thirds of that.” She nodded back toward the crowd. “Thanks man, I owe ya.” </p><p>“Ah put on a show.” Neon J gave a quick salute. </p><p>That left Eve and Mayday sat in silence. Not the fun kind, that thick horrid kind that builds itself up bit by bit. It leaks out and starts to fill the room until you’re drowning in it. It’s not that you want to say anything, it's that if you don’t you’ll suffocate. You’ve got to draw in air. You know it’s a bad idea and it’s only going to hurt but it’ll happen. Sooner or later someone breaks and then it-</p><p>“I’m sorry.” </p><p>Eve is sure she heard that wrong. “What are you-”</p><p>“I know this sucks for you. The whole,” Mayday chewed the words had to be right, “image thing. The whole….” She groaned and picked up her guitar. “I get not wanting to look...bad.” Mayday said. “You worry about it, right? You feel like people don't get you or what you do and this is probably the same thing. This is like that on stilts huh?” </p><p>Eve looked at the drums in front of her. “It’s one thing to do something you’re utterly sure of for an audience but to do something you’re barely aware of…” She let out a little sound. “Daunting.” </p><p>“You can…” Mayday let out a long sigh. “You can go, if you want. It’s...you did more than you had to.” </p><p>“But your show?”</p><p>“I can...work the crowd for a bit. Maybe stay late, sign some stuff...maybe you’ll sort stuff out with Zuke and we can do an encore?” Mayday said all of this but she didn’t look like she wanted it. </p><p>“How long until the curtain goes up?” Eve asked. </p><p>“Ten minutes max.” </p><p>“Ten minutes.” Eve closed her eyes. “This is a selfish rescue mission.” </p><p>“That’s a great album name.” Mayday said.</p><p>“I am full of those.” </p><p> </p><p>--- Within</p><p>Zuke scratched his chin, chewing absently on the gum he’d brought with him. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been inside Eve, longer than he really ever should be. But it worked up an appetite. He wondered if he could get delivery….30 minutes or it’s free, he’d never have to pay for another pizza in his life. That said if he ordered a pizza to Eve she would murder him...or be very upset at his choices. </p><p>He let his legs dangle out the open door of his and Eve’s ad-hoc artiste home. Still floating high above the clouds and facing the giant manifestation of art-block. The grinning, beastial face of Mayday scowling back at him. </p><p>He really wished he hadn’t dropped his phone. Nobody would ever believe any single thing he saw in here.</p><p>“Zuke we don’t have a lot of time.” Eve said at his side, he went tense. “Ten minutes to curtain, I need to ask you some things.” </p><p>“I haven’t figured out how to get over there. I thought it’d be like a movie and I could walk on the clouds.” Zuke said before pointing down. “I threw out like a rock to test it and the rock did not float, even a little. SO….yeah.” He clapped his hands and turned to Eve. “What's umm going on?” </p><p>“Mayday is very angry at me but also trying her best to understand me.” Eve said. “She made a very cognizant argument toward the position of an artist and audience. Stating that the amount of audience members doesn’t matter but working to enrich them and yourself is a good goal.” </p><p>“Mayday and me we never got to power the Qwaza or stuff like that.” He leaned back to look up at Eve, squatting down on the back of her heels to peer down at him. “I mean we did power the Grand one but that was…” He rolled his eyes. “A thing. To us the audience has never been a means to supply power or get projects going. They’re just the fans, the guys who show up.” </p><p>“I understand that.” Eve replied. “It’s obvious fans are important to creation. We don’t like to admit it but a lot of us do this and want the attention it brings.”</p><p>“Nothing wrong with that.” Zuke said. “Some people kick themselves in the head for attention and others rock out.” </p><p>“More so the bigger a performance the greater energy we could impart to the city but…” She leaned on her arms. “I never thought of them much.” Eve confessed. “Not hard to imagine given the state of my district. But no matter what I did I had sold out venues and standing ovations. It came easy. The adulation.” </p><p>“It can.” Zuke said. “To some people they just capture fame on their rise. I’ve said it before Eve and I’ve meant it every time. You are the most talented performer and artist I know.” Zuke closed his eyes. “I still remember old shows and ideas you had. Pictures of you when I wandered around. To some of us through hard work or luck or who knows the planets align we fall into fame.” </p><p>Eve is quiet looking down at Zuke. Oddly serene despite the situation. No nerves, no restless energy, just waiting. </p><p>“Mayday and me we got a lot of our love fixing up districts and making a ruckus. We lost a lot of it when we lost control of that ruckus.” Zuke exhaled blowing a long blue dread out of his face. “I mean you could argue we never had the wheel and that Klff guy was driving the bus, but we put fuel in the tanks.” </p><p>“That fuel was desperation to be heard and a demand to be accepted.” He smirked at that. “The more things change. You can’t force the people to love you but the people who love you never needed to be forced.” </p><p>“I’m scared.” Eve tells him and he looks at her, near balled up. “I’ve never done this before.” </p><p>“Yeah you have.” Zuke told her, he reached out for her, sliding back into the house. He put an arm around her back. “You’ve done this a hundred times.” He told her. “You’ve put on a hundred shows and rocked them all.” </p><p>“Not played drums.” She said sullen.</p><p>“So you’ll be shaky.” Zuke told her. “Mayday will love you for it.” He told her. “It’s...you remember earlier what you said to me earlier? Endless creative dynamo, wonder of ideas and all that?” He asked her but she didn’t say anything. “Mayday...and you got that in common. She’s the same way but with music. You might have all these ideas and projects and movements but she’s got music.” </p><p>“She’s very good.” </p><p>“I said you’re the best performer and artist I know Eve. She’s the best musician I have ever met.” Zuke smiled. “She’s got a lot of passion and it carries you. Well it goads you on, it’s fire at your heels and inspires you to run with her.” He smirks. “It’s not going to be a huge crowd but she’s gonna whip them up to feel like they’re the biggest crowd in the world.” </p><p>“It’s important to you that it’s important to her isn’t it?” Eve looked up at Zuke who nodded to her. </p><p>“It’s just...important.” Zuke shrugged. “Doesn’t need to be important to anyone to matter. Sometimes you create to create. Sometimes you gotta share it even if it’s a little rough.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’m going to ruin it.” </p><p>“Nah...a page covered in scribbles Eve, better than a blank page every time. You’re strong, Eve. It’s only a coward who won’t try to create, who won’t try out of fear of not excelling. So your first time on drums is a nightmare. Mine wasn’t much better.” He leaned against her. “You know the first evidence of me singing, ever, is on a record West owns. If he plays it and I hear it...I’ll throw haymakers.”</p><p>Eve looked at him, the very idea of him swinging for anyone was baffling. West….well the very image of his big stupid grin was enough to make her consider violence. Zuke wasn’t most people. </p><p>“Does it embarrass me? Yeah.” Zuke confessed. “Did it stop me trying again? No. You gotta soak up a little awkward once in a while.” </p><p>Eve leaned against him. “It’s important.” She said with a low breath. “Performing is who I am, this is just a new thing isn’t it?” </p><p>“It is…” He stood up. “Know that...I’m here rooting for you. Sincerely you’ll do great Eve, you always do. I’d say something like listen to your heart or...whatever but umm...if you can hear where I am maybe listen to that. I dunno, do you get surround sound out there of in here?” </p><p>Eve let out a little wheeze and shook her head. “Neon J might also think I ate you.”</p><p>“Is this like gonna be our gossip column story?” Zuke asked, looking at her over his shoulder. “Like it’s not who kisses who or DK West tells of how he jetski’d over a shark. It’s gonna be; noted celebrity Eve eats drummer of BunkBed Junction in attempt at therapy” </p><p>“Yes. It is. Unlike West ours will be 25% more true.” Eve said. “I can ghost write it, sell it and we can split the profits 50/50. Both deny it vehemently but in the most obviously suspicious way we can.” </p><p>“No sir, that's a strange impossible story. Did you know Eve has a filling on the back right molar?” </p><p>“I do not!” Eve said. “My teeth are flawless,” she said and Zuke made a low whistle sound, pressing his tongue against his front two teeth. Eve flared up and spun away from him. “I’m never letting you out. You’re stuck here. Forever, for being so horrible to me.”</p><p>“I’m on-” Zuke paused. The block looked...different. “Eve I think I have an idea.” He said and whistled again.</p><p>“Forever, Zuke. I will leave you in here.” Eve went on before turning, Zuke was whistling a tune out loud. She turned and as she did the house shifted, it moved slowly. She saw that inexorably they were being drawn toward the giant block as Zuke made music. “Of course...it stifles creativity. It abhors it, stops it and cuts it off.”</p><p>Zuke kept whistling and looked back at her. Clearly delighted it was working. “Only….” Eve thought. “What does it do next?” </p><p>Zuke whistling got quieter as he turned to look at Eve. “See that’s a thing I wish I had thought of before I kept whistling.” He turned around to see the cube open, crackle apart around the face. Within was a bare, almost shiny. “Oh.” Zuke said as once he and a chunk of the house were in the cube closed, bisecting the house and sending it, Zuke and Eve hurtling downward. </p><p>“I HATE THIS!” Zuke yelled at the top of his lungs as Eve screamed, she jostled suddenly leaping forward to try and grab hold of Zuke, grab hold of anything before-</p><p> </p><p>---- Without </p><p>Eve rocked back in her seat, her face pale and sweat running down her back. Mayday looked back at her concerned. </p><p>“You good?” She asked and Eve shook her head. “Do you gotta go?” </p><p>“No…” She said flatly. “I have to,” she picked up the drumsticks, “put on a show.” She nodded toward Mayday. “It’s important that we put on a show.” </p><p>“What about Zuke?” Mayday asked. </p><p>“Oh….a big rock in the sky with you on it ate him.” Eve said and Mayday looked at her for a minute. “Deadly serious.” </p><p>“You know they never covered that in my biology class.” Mayday said. “You might wanna...see a doctor or like...eight.” </p><p>“What and waste time being told I’m perfect?” Eve flashed a smile. “Zuke is...fine. He won’t be hurt.” </p><p>“You sure?”</p><p>“I told him I wouldn’t hurt him.” Eve said and Mayday nodded. “So he’s fine.”</p><p>“Makes sense.” Mayday said and Eve scoffed. “No for real this time. That’s the most normal thing you’ve said all day. You ready to rock?”</p><p>“Oh I’m ready to try…” Eve held up the sticks. There was a faint whine as the curtains came apart and the spotlights shone down. </p><p>“Are you reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaady?” Mayday called out and the response was a wall of sound. The venue was not big, as Zuke had said. Some kind of little hall, no seats and all standing room. It really wasn’t the sort of place you’d think a one time multidistrict owning band would play. But here they were, packed shoulder to shoulder roaring at the top of their lungs. </p><p>“Zuke got a lil stuck in traffic! So we got a fill in for a bit!” Mayday cried out. “Make her feel welcome!” She called and the fans did just that, was her crowd this noisy? It felt like a slap that covered every inch of her. It started at her toes and bolted up the length of her spine, was this the audience? </p><p>No wonder the Qwaza was so powerful, if you could bottle this energy you’d be putting new stars in the sky. Her audience she’d never noticed if they made a sound, they just showed up. She wasn’t present with them, these people were here! These people were unmistakably here. </p><p>Neon J was instantly visible among the crowd, his creen face displaying a large cartoonish hand holding a lighter. The crowd is making some noises when Mayday shuts the room up with a belt from the guitar, you can’t compete with that thing for noise. She feels the roar crash over her and dive bomb into the audience. </p><p>She starts playing, she does what she can to provide a basic follow on. She keeps a beat and does her best to keep up. She can feel the scream behind her, the heat scorching off the amps and licking at the tips of her hair. Speed up, keep up, run! Zuke wasn’t lying, it was trying to race an inferno before it burned down the world. </p><p>Mayday, turned to look at her nodding to her. Keep that beat, keep that energy. Don’t go wild let her steer the crowd. She had them by the hand and they’d race her barefoot up a hill of broken bottles at the pace she was making. That old guitar that Kul Fyra dragged her way to the top with was a monster. That thing had soaked and swam through the original rock revolution before being hung up to dry. How long had it sat there, restless and waiting for someone to let it roar again? </p><p>This thing, this old bastard guitar that still had the voice of the devil in it. Too stubborn to wilt, too stubborn to even get dusty. This monster licking its chops and chasing Eve. She was ahead of it, keeping the beat but god it was relentless. Rock and roll, was this the noise and power it brought up in you? </p><p>Her heart thudded in her chest, primal energies. The first storms in the world. The mythmakers and the sound that to this day we jump at. The big bang was a warm up, this guitar was here to show you true heat, true fire and it would go until there was nothing left. </p><p>Mayday did something that made Eve almost stop playing, almost gasp in sheer wonder. As she brought that guitar up to her teeth and there was a scorching wail as she chewed out a truly luscious belt of sound. As she raised the guitar over her head, steam crawled from her mouth and rose over her head. </p><p>Flames licking around her ears and sprinting over her hair, lit fuses a partial Qwaza transformation, right there and then without an interface or aperture. The sleek bruning visage of Kul’s face floated over Mayday for just a moment, sparks drew as her tongue scraped across her teeth. That grinning visage takes in the audience until with a clack of teeth Mayday cuts it off. Back to her smiling face.</p><p>“That song is called “It’s not my problem till tomorrow.’” Mayday grinned as the crowd lapped it up, applause ringing out. Whistling blowing out Eve’s ears. The audience could be part of the show? No, ha, no….Interactive exhibits with minimal supervised interaction. But these people were stomping their feet, screaming the names of songs and trying to...sing along. </p><p>Could they do that? Were audiences….ALLOWED to do that?</p><p>--- Within</p><p>Zuke felt like he’d landed funny and sat up, peeking behind himself he let out a choked scream. He’d landed on the Eve mannequin or...Eve tried to soften his fall before she got pulled back out of….well here. </p><p>Zuke and the house had seen better days, utterly ruined. He left the shell of the art-deco masterpiece and tried to take in his surroundings. There wasn’t much. The whole place was vast but nearly totally barren. The walls and floor reminded him of nacre, soft and polished and totally void of anything. No substance, no bumps, no shape and nothing to make it stand out. Nearby there was a bowl sat on a plinth, the inside of the bowl was a polished gold with a faint smear. </p><p>Zuke swiped his finger across it and rubbed his fingers. Soot. Coal ash...Why did this look familiar to him. He ran his finger around the rim of the bowl and found that it felt warm to the touch. “Ah,” he said after a moment, “I know you.” Or at least he knew the cheap nasty version you could buy for a couple of bucks at the Metro. It was...he didn’t know the exact name but you made fires in this sort of bowl. </p><p>He and May had bought one expressly to make marshmallows. You put some stuff in the bowl, lit the fire and after a while it went out. Wash the bowl repeat. Zuke stood there, hands on his hips for a moment. </p><p>“Really?” He asked out loud, his voice rebounding around him. “Oh, wow this is a literal echo chamber huh?” He snickered at that, his little laugh building to a crescendo. No artist is without their traps, their self dug potholes. The echochamber is a big one, where you go to get comfy and listen to people tell you that you’re nailing it, no need to change, keep it steady my friend, do not rock that boat and do not try any harder cause you made it. </p><p>“So, this is the big bad art block.” Zuke mumbled. “I might never get to do this again. You suck and I speak for every artist in the world when I say this will be therapeutic.” He moved back to the wreck of the house and gathered up what was left of the door. He paused to look at the Mannequin of Nadia and shook his head.</p><p>She said it didn’t hurt her. He wasn’t going to use her for this. He couldn’t break her up, that wouldn’t feel right. He tossed the splinters of the door into the bowl, trying to break them up into manageable chunks. </p><p>Fire was primal and linked to creativity. Prometheus was the stand out example, stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. It’s sort of accepted that this was gifting man with knowledge and fire at the same time, Prometheus gives man that creative spark that birthed all our ideas. He just had to snatch it, like they said great artists steal. </p><p>He’s not sure if the door is enough, he tosses in the wrappers and junk from his pocket. Shame he was looking forward to that backrub after today, he felt like he’d earned it. He rubbed at the back of his neck and groaned. Hell with it, might not get to try again later. </p><p>He slipped off his shirt and tossed it in, slinging on his jacket and shuddering at the feeling of cold in the room. He spun his drumsticks, one in each hand. Turned the dials on the bottom all the way up. </p><p>“Performing, live, one night only inside the most talented woman he knows, Zuke!” He cried out and the room carried his voice back to him. He started to play, slow he had to find the beat first. He felt it out, let himself keep the rhythm. Then one hand cut out and struck the side of the bowl sparks flew. Nothing yet, harder then? Faster then? Fine. So be it. </p><p>Eve had always said she was the Earth and he was the Sea. Back then he’d smile and nod, whatever she wanted was the most correct observation. She was the master and him, the student lucky enough to tag along and smart enough to do what he was told.  He didn’t agree. Eve was the sea as far as he was concerned. Serene at one time, deadly at another, haunting, alluring and everything in between. She had great gifts to bestow but she’d snatch your life if allowed to. </p><p>Him. He was the earth or he’d graduated to it. Back then he was a puddle trying be the sea, he couldn’t cut it. But the earth that felt better, that felt more like him. The earth doesn’t need to constantly move, it doesn’t need to change in a moment it just waits and watches. The earth is always there when you need it and when you don’t. Dependable. The earth is a solid mass and it has patience but when it moves you feel it, everyone feels it. There’s boiling hot potential there, it can weather the worst that fire and the sea can throw it. He’d survived Eve, he hated to put it like that but he had. He bolted and that’s when whatever sort of liquid he was evaporated away. </p><p>He picks up speed, he goes at the drums like they deserve what's coming. Mellow he might be but you don’t get to be a rock drummer resting on your laurels. His wrists can sound like cement mixers at times, he can’t blink as he drums faster and faster. The holographic toms and cymbals bleed in and out of reality as he strikes. He has to alternate the power on and off to strike the bowl. Faster, faster, flick, faster, faster flick! He puts his whole arm into it and he starts to feel the pressure rebound around that chamber. </p><p>His own thunderous beats slamming back into him, over and over. It’s thunder but no lightning, the sound of giants trodding across the world and demanding you get up. He strikes the bowl. There’s nothing but the sound and the pressure. His arms are blurs, when the earth starts to shake everyone moves with it. The sea swells and shakes and fires rage from within. He lets it all out, the speed and fury comes with it. He strikes the bowl, sparks flare. </p><p>He goes faster, harder, the whole room shakes with the sound, the nonstop thrashing. A drummer doesn’t need to be an animal he just has to be able to handle the one he’s got thrashing around. He strikes the bowl, sparks and his shadow grows up the wall as the heat soars. The shadow stretches and looms over that fire, covets that heat. He keeps hammering out a tune, he keeps attacking the drums and the bowl. More sparks, more heat, more sound, more fury, crack the egg and live or the idea suffocates. </p><p>He starts to feel a sweat build up across his back. He strikes the bowl and pulls his hand back, it feels hot. He peeks at that roaring inferno, the spark catches and that’s where ideas start. The flickers and stirring of ashes. Zuke doesn’t stop playing, his shadow grows tall and lean. He’s not West who has mastery of the strange shadow puppet arts but the shadow strikes out against the walls around it. As it grows the animal rebels against its cage. Some ideas are big and dangerous but all the same they want out in one form another. Some songs worm their way out, some stories demand they be written and some canvases refuse to stay blank.</p><p>Zuke raised his hands and sticks above his head. “BUNKA! JUNKA!”</p><p> </p><p>--- Without </p><p>The world is shaking, can nobody else feel it? It’s so hot in here can nobody else feel it!? Was it supposed to feel like that? Nobody was playing, she heard something. No felt something shake. Something start thudding somewhere and the drumset in front of her didn’t suddenly feel ten miles wide and impossible. Another thud, the world was shaking now and no that was her. She was shaking, why was she shaking? Her drumsticks tap relentlessly against the rim of one of the toms...something wanted out. Something needed out. </p><p>She spun the sticks around her fingers. Fine, fine, you want sound and you want the earth to move. She could do that, tectonic movements were simple. She clashed the sticks together and Mayday looked back at her, confusion there for half a second until the sticks clashed again. </p><p>“Oooh,” Mayday coo’d out, “alright you want to lead?” Another clash of those sticks and a kick to the base drum that had the whole room stomp with it. “Bunka.” Mayday strummed, a roar from the amps.</p><p>“Junka.” Eve clashed the sticks again. Move the world, bring it all down, these people want to go to war with noise. She’d show them noise. If she’s going to play these drums she’s playing them so hard these people won’t forget it. </p><p> </p><p>“Shakalaka.” </p><p>“BAM.”</p><p>The room shook, honest to goodness, with that first slam. She put everything into it, a tremendous force down on the skins, then it’s a drum roll. Quick, intense, quiet but nobodies making a sound as it steadily builds, builds, builds and she goes to slam a cymbal with everything behind it- only to tap it lightly. That gets a laugh from the audience, she smirks at that, the drum stick spins deftly between her fingers. </p><p>She starts tapping on the rim of the main-tom a pensive look on her face as she raises her other hand back. Eve looks to Mayday, her hand hovers over the low tom. Mayday shakes the whammy bar, a low long groan. Eve nods, keeps tapping faster and faster, moves her to the mid tom wobbling the stick. Mayday jerks the whammy a couple times, thrusting to the side, over one more. </p><p>A dialogue is essential, you might not always be understood but when you are. </p><p>Eve moves to the high tom and Mayday nods over and over, shredding the same low growl on that guitar. Start the fire Eve, start the inferno all over again. Her arm comes down like a guillotine, Mayday jumps up in the air and it’s like a fucking bomb goes off in that room. Feet are stomping, fans are screaming but it might as well be at the bottom of the deepest darkest pit because nothing can be heard over the monsters on stage. </p><p>Eve hasn’t drummed in her life, she doesn’t know if she’s any good or she’s just damn loud but it feels so right. Rolling from one end of the drum set to the other, hitting the skins and just getting out that loud warm bang, bang, bang and when the thunder reaches its apex slapping the snare or cracking the cymbal and starting all over again. Is this the right form? Is she doing it right? She has no idea but the crowd is swinging their arms around and begging for more, more, faster and loud and more! Mayday hasn’t stopped playing, she’s making her own movements and sounds. She’s not sprinting ahead, every time the drum snaps out the guitar cries after it. </p><p>She’s no idea where it comes from but she throws the drumstick behind her back. Another arm catches it to crash down on. It’s a wild show passing the sticks from hand to hand, hitting the drums at angles and in ways that’s half juggling act and half beatdown. To be honest it’s hard to tell if she’s playing the drum of trying to destroy it at this point. She speeds up, Mayday can you keep up? </p><p>She kicks out the seat from under her and stands up, fingers twist together on growing limbs into spare sticks and goes at it. This is her putting her all into, is it good or is it just loud? It really doesn’t matter to her right now, this feels fantastic. Head banging as she goes, hair flying over the place. If it wasn’t obvious who she was a moment ago in her quiet little clothes, secrets out now. Eve on drums and like everything she’s ever done she’s making a show of it. She’s a drum machine now, and the crowd are screaming and screaming and screaming. Mayday is keeping up, hell she could go faster but this is her few minutes to shine. These are her-</p><p>Her fists shatter through the drums and there’s a loud...total silence. Even the guitar wailing stops, as if shocked. The only sound Eve can hear is the thundering in her chest and the quiet shallow breathing. Hair glued to her face as she looks down at the mess she’s made of everything.</p><p>Oh no….oh no, she must look like an absolute idiot. She looks at the crowd. The bodies of the toms stuck around her morphed limbs like massive bangles she shakes them awkwardly. Nobody makes a sound.</p><p>“ROCK AND ROLL!” Neon J belts out from the back of the room and the crowd is once again a single living tide of energy. </p><p>“One night only Eve! Not only on drums, she’s wearing them.” Mayday said wiggling Eve’s arms around. “New fashion line?”</p><p>“The Bunk-Bed Aesthetic.” Eve says without a hint of irony. “Cobbled together from stuff laying around and smashed together.” </p><p>“Chique.” Mayday grins. “We’ll need five here people, to grab a new drum set. Apparently I’m cursed to work with holo-drummers!” She raised her hand to her face as the audience clapped their departure. Curtains were pulled closed quickly. </p><p>“I’m so sorry I lost-</p><p>“IF you do that at every show...I might have to start attending. Do you just break stuff? Did Zuke hide the maniac in you from me?” Mayday couldn’t possibly have looked prouder in that moment. “Oh that was good, oh my gaaaah the arms!” She said gesturing to Eve. “The bit with the,” she bit down on her lips and laughed a little as she tried to pull off the remains of the drums. “That was great.” </p><p>“It was?” Eve looked at her. </p><p>“I mean...a little all over the place, but I loved that intensity.” Mayday shrugged. “Musta got a real course off Zuke in that time.” She tugged free a broken drum and sighed. “Doomed to holodrums forever.” She groaned. “While I tear this down you can help Zuke or whatever it’s gonna take.”</p><p>“Oh no I can help you and him.” Eve said. “The issue has been resolved, rest assured everything will be back to where it should be soon..” Eve said</p><p>“You what?”</p><p>---- Within</p><p>Zuke feels the cube shake and it’s not him, he’s sure of it because even he loses his footing. He nearly spills and at last the sound stops. He looks around as cracks form on the surface of his little prison within prison. The tips of fingers shatter through the space above, large and pink. </p><p>Course Eve can fix it herself, strong woman. Just needed the spark clearly. A great fissure spread the length from the top of the cube to the bottom, spearing between Zuke’s legs. He watched the crack race up to a new hole in the opposite side. </p><p>“Wait….if she breaks...I’m gonna fall again aren’t I?” Zuke looked down at the crack as the whole place broke apart. Below him was just clouds. He screwed shut his eyes and let out a loud scream as gravity seized him. </p><p>“Zuke.” He heard Eve say. “What are you doing?”</p><p>“Falling! Falling to my doom!?” He said not feeling like he was falling. “Not...falling to my doom?!” </p><p>“You’re not falling to your doom.” Eve said warmly. “I said it before. I’m everything here, the warmth, the ground, the sky and even gravity. If I tell you that you soar, you soar.” He felt a hand stroke at his cheek and he opened his eyes slowly. </p><p>He was very much up in the air, held up in the arms of Eve, who’d grown an extra set to fold over her chest and look down at him. “Hey.” He said trying to hold closed his jacket. </p><p>“Where is your shirt?” Eve asked with a grin, one hand prodding his chest. </p><p>“I umm...in the umm block was a big bowl for putting fire in. Kinda prometheus thing,” Zuke said slowly and Eve nodded. </p><p>“Gift of knowledge, spark of inspiration sure.” She went on. “Why your shirt?” </p><p>“I had to burn something!” Zuke snapped. “The door frame and my shirt and my backrub token. “He said. </p><p>“Not the doll?” Eve asked him and he noticed it wasn’t Nadia he was talking to but Eve. Not the simple college clothes but the stunning performer. </p><p>“I said I didn’t wanna hurt you.” Zuke said looking to one side. Eve let out a little laugh and so did he. “Are you umm...gonna put me down?” </p><p>“In a moment, this is nice.” Eve said looking down at him. “Thank you, Zuke.”</p><p>“Eh you did most of it.” Zuke said looking up to find the sky devoid of the giant Mayday cube of art block. A vast slowly spinning sun in its place, a figure in the center of it sat in contemplation as heat rained down. “You umm still look really good as a celestial body.” </p><p>“Hot?” She asked grinning, eyebrows going up and down. “The exact term you used in college, I think.” </p><p>“Eve, uh ha.” He turned away sure he could feel heat running to his face. “We um, ahem, you know. We have a different relationship now.” He said, much as parts of him didn’t want him to say it. </p><p>“I know.” Eve told him her voice a little lower. “But you did JUST light a fire in me Zuke.” She said with a laugh and he laughed at that too. “Residual feelings, we’ll call it. You also helped me, a lot today.” </p><p>“I said I would.” Zuke said quickly, a new hand appeared and turned him to face Eve leaning down toward him. </p><p>“Thank you, Zuke.” She said. “Today I let you into the most intimate, special place I have. We don’t see eye to eye on….everything, we won’t and I accept that. But I feel close to you, closer than I have been or ever could be to anyone else.”  She laughed. “Physically we cannot be closer without becoming one, which we don’t want.” </p><p>Zuke nodded slowly unable to break away from her stare, he saw stars swimming behind her eyes. Vast spinning nebulas of heat and fire. He swallowed again. “We’re special to each other Eve, yeah.” </p><p>“Yes. We are. I would like you to remain special to me.” She toyed with the little sideburns on the side of his face. “I like to be close to you Zuke.” </p><p>“I like...close.” Zuke said as words failed to get out. Her eyes were just, portals to somewhere else. Vast unending wonders seemed to dwell there. Zuke would do more in his life, see more but he was sure in that single moment. There in her arms that if you could put a face on it would be what it looks like if an entire universe loved you. </p><p>Eve was always something special, he supposed here in this place where everything was at its most pure she’d be even grander. Music gave some people power but she’d never needed that. The things she could do without effort, the powers she had in the merest of moments were so much more.  Zuke did you actually fall in love with someone with entire universes in them? Did you fall head over heels for a living, breathing goddess? West would absolutely tell him he had no chance, zero percent to gain here. </p><p>But right now...looking in her eyes he...he figured he had a higher chance than that. </p><p>“Good.” Eve told him. “We should remain close, Zuke. Not together...but close.” She said. “I do not imagine you’d be in a hurry to return but know that if you wanted to come back here I would always welcome you.”</p><p>“Do you think you could take Mayday joking about it anymore?” He asked and Eve let out a low laugh, a little snort at the start. “Cause...I can think of...worse places to spend an afternoon.” </p><p>“For you? Probably.” Eve touched down somewhere. “Let's….get you out of here, shall we?” </p><p>“How do we uhh...do that?” Zuke asked as he was placed down on the ground. Her hands clasped around his face. “Oh you better not turn into a giant puddle again or at least let me take a deep breath.” She tapped the tip of his nose with a finger, he just grinned at her.</p><p>“Look into my eyes.” Eve told him and he was already lost. “Open your mind.” She leaned forward, slowly, surely, taking up all the space in the world. “Close your eyes.” She whispered her breath on his lips. He did as he was told. </p><p>Ba-Bump.</p><p>---- Without</p><p>“You can get Zuke back?” Mayday said giddy. “That’s awesome! How are we gonna do this? You need me to hold back your hair.”</p><p>“...One more, one more line like that and I keep him forever.” Eve said folding her arms and looking down at Mayday. </p><p>“Just one more?” </p><p>“No.” Eve said walking into the wall. Her body smeared, went flat as she fused with the surface. She nudged aside the various posters and tacked up venue notices on the wall. She slowly grew taller, wider, her body lost definition and became less human. Eyes sliding down a two tone set of shapes until slowly a door forced itself free of the wall. </p><p>It opened with a sound like a sigh and Zuke stepped out, fog drifting around him. Long wisps in the shape of arms, slowly, teasingly dragged against his exposed skin before retreating back into the door. Closing sharply behind him. </p><p>“Wow.” Zue breathed, smoke sliding out between his lips. </p><p>“Zuke!” Mayday tackled him to the ground. “Oh you’re alive and not dead!” She said tears in her eyes. “I’m so happy! I thought you were a total goner!” </p><p>“May!” Zuke rattled trying to shove her off of him. “I was fine! I was fine!” </p><p>“You got ATE Zuke, that's the least fine thing!” </p><p>“I wasn’t eaten I got...like..subsumed. Which is totally different.” Zuke said and Mayday sat up. </p><p>“Why didn’t she say that?” Mayday asked, a shadow looming over her and Zuke.</p><p>“I will murder you. With incredible, horrible, precise agony that lasts forever.” Eve said from behind Mayday. </p><p>“He explained it better.” Mayday pointed at Zuke. “Also why are you shirtless?” </p><p>“I….had to do a whole thing.” </p><p>“Was this all a kinky thing?” Mayday asked and you could have cooked an egg on Zuke’s face. “Zuke if this is your fetish I feel like you should tell me so I can support you and rip on you endlessly.” Mayday asked and Zuke swatted at her. “For real dude I’m glad you’re okay.”</p><p>“I’m fine.” Zue said sitting up. “Eve wouldn’t hurt me.”</p><p>“She said the same thing.”</p><p>“There ya go then.” Zuke stood up, buttoning his jacket. “How did um….the concert go?”</p><p>“We had to take a break.” Mayday said hooking a thumb toward Eve. “This animal destroyed a drum set by rocking out too hard.” She had never looked prouder. Zuke smiled at that. </p><p>“So she managed?” He said as Eve handed him a slip of paper. “What’s this?”</p><p>“You said you lost your back rub voucher.” Eve said. “Replacement. Good for one time.” He looked at the elaborate signature and writing and nodded at the little voucher. </p><p>“You lost your phone, backrub voucher and your shirt.” Mayday looked between the pair. “Is there anything you didn’t lose inside her?” </p><p>“Tell me about it.” Eve drawled with a smile. “Litterbug.” </p><p>“My mind.” Zuke offered up and Mayday shrugged. “So we got a show to do?” </p><p>“WE got a show to do.” Mayday agreed. </p><p>“If you wanna stick around, Eve that’d be fine. I mean clearly people probably know you're here now.” </p><p>“NO hiding that.” Mayday laughed around the words. “For real, six arm giant drum solo!” </p><p>“I could get out,” Eve said frankly, “it’s very hard to spot someone like me when I don't want to be seen. That said, clearly it’s a show worth watching. I’ll be back here.” She said before pausing. “On second thought...I will regret saying this, the moment I do. But...I am actually hungry now.”</p><p>Mayday made a quiet noise and Eve shoved a finger in her face. “If you say anything, I won’t get you anything.” </p><p>Mayday’s cheeks puffed out, but she gave a thumbs up. </p><p>“Burgers good?” Eve asked and the reply was a pair of nods. “Great.” She turned and made her way toward the exit. She walked into the shadows and didn’t walk back out, the door didn’t even open but she was...probably gone. </p><p>“Did...she not ask what kind of burgers we wanted?”</p><p>“No. When you eat with Eve you don’t pick.” Zuke shooks his head. “Still the same as it ever was…”</p><p>“You good?” Mayday asked looking up at him. “Like for real, you okay?”</p><p>Zuke let out a long sigh. “Today was a day, May.” He said, shaking his head. “I really got some...energy to work out now.” </p><p>“That’s great. She had a lot of enthusiasm but not a lot of timing.” Mayday said. “Energy though, ooooh lotta that. You should look this concert up online. I think you’d dig it.” Mayday said. “So….rock the house?” She held out her fist.</p><p>“Rock the house.” Zuke clapped his knuckles against hers. He followed her toward the stage.</p><p>“So you two dating again?”</p><p>“May...please let me just...work out some feelings on stage.”</p><p>At the end of the day why you create isn’t always important. Some people do it because it’s the very beating heart of what they are. To not create is the same as to withhold air. Others create because they want to get famous. Others to be heard and seen and have a good time. Honestly there’s no wrong reason to create. Make some noise, sing that funky music or hell write the sappy weird fanfiction that haunts the dark parts of your skull. </p><p>You only get one shot, a messy canvas might not look ideal but I swear to you it looks better than an empty one. Be messy, be downright filthy if you gotta.</p><p>Just get out there and make some noise. Would ya? Art block sucks, writer's block sucks but I promise you there’s a way around it or through it you got some good buddies. Just...you know, maybe don’t be as literal as this story. Medically unsafe.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>If you got this far thanks very much for reading. I have hopes to do more with these characters and these odd ideas I've had for them in the future. But I suppose the last question is....Backrub epilogue? Has Zuke earned it?</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Touch, I remember touch. Pictures came with touch.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Shirt staying on this time, Zuke?” Eve had set up a table and chair, the latter of which Zuke was way off almost the instant he saw it. Still he had a coupon and it’d be a shame to let it go to waste. </p><p>“I mean, May never doesn’t have me do that.” Zuke said looking at the art hanging on the wall. A few updated pieces, new imagery here and there. Serene colours and open landscapes. “Have you been visiting Natura?” </p><p>“Yes,” Eve pursed her lips and leaned to one side, “I’ve been collecting scraps of the great Mangroove tree. I wanted to see if i could piece together a facsimile from copies of photographs.” </p><p>“Oh?” Zuke rubbed at his chin. “A statement on how artificial memories via photographs can take the place of physical objects in the world?” Zuke looked to Eve. </p><p>“Not quite. More on how even memories are fleeting, I’d age the photographs to wilt as the year went on and eventually rot leaving a bare skeleton.” Eve went on, Zuke nodded. “So far I’ve been trying to capture the Mangroove in still life before I work on creating a physical model.” She sighed. “A truly enchanting plant.” </p><p>“Yeah, I think West might have some old stuff...pretty sure he carved his name into it.” Zuke said, looking to one side rubbing at the back of his neck. “You know how many weird photos he used to take.”</p><p>“Yes. Quite.” Eve’s tone sounded far off and distant, thoughts of West dulled the conversation. “Tatiana had some photographs, admittedly they are crowded with fans and such but there are some views of the tree.” </p><p>“Oh from touring as Kul Fyra?” Zuke remembered some of the posters and photos Mayday had hung up of that chaotic ‘Burn The World Down’ tour. Shots crowded, standing room only everywhere she went. A megastar among megastars. “I guess she would have seen it back then.” </p><p>“Most of her photographs however are of backstage, setting up venues and The Goolings, I suppose expecting a touring rocker to double as a nature photographer was foolish.” Eve let out a little sigh. “Still she has inherently well done framing, a hidden shutterbug if ever there was one.” </p><p>“Really?” Zuke asked, trying to picture Tatiana as anything but the stern leader of NSR. Imagining her outside of her office was hard enough, picturing her taking a serene walk and some nice photos...it was alien. </p><p> </p><p>“She has many talents, Zuke. Approaching her, I’ve been told seems difficult. Though I’ve never had an issue with it. A conversation or two showed me she was very accepting and understanding of me.” Eve’s mouth turns up at the corners. “Not exactly like you but I suppose you could say she indulged where you challenged.” </p><p>“I was a challenge?” Zuke didn’t believe that for a second. He remembered the old puppy love stares and sighs. </p><p>“You offered contrary opinions to my work, alternate analysis and at times you have very valid visions.” Eve told him. “Totally incorrect visions but the idea was solid enough that I had to respect the introspection.” She leaned one way pacing around the table Zuke sat on. Eyes not leaving him, Zuke couldn’t help but notice any painting with eyes was also...looking right at him. “We both know how that turned out,” she said while opening a small cabinet against the wall. </p><p>Yeah he didn’t need reminding. </p><p>“Tatiana never quite challenged anything but...she always understood it.” Eve said. “Always asked if I could do more; what would I do. It was….an interesting question.” Eve came out with a thin tube. “You saw Dreamfever. It was almost a one person art exhibit, other people lived there but it was a space all for me.” </p><p>“Tatiana and you launched NSR and got the whole ball rolling.” Zuke conceded. “Your shows and the resources she had it’s no wonder the system seemed so perfect all those years.” Zuke recalled having to lock himself in his room for a while when his ex-girlfriend became the face of the city. Fresh memories of the incident teased and tormented him and he couldn’t help but feel guilty everywhere he looked. </p><p>“Yes. She never fought me, never belittled my ideas, never argued with them but she called each of them a wonder.” Eve smiled, lost in some memory. “It was a miracle, when I was powering the entire city single handedly back then it was a good feeling. I will always owe Tatiana for that, helping me find myself again.” </p><p>“I’m sorry I let you get lost.” Zuke said and her shoulders rose and fell. </p><p>“We can both say sorry until we’re blue in the face,” Eve turned to look at Zuke, “if we want to move on we had best stop saying we’re sorry and just start being sorry.” She moved toward him with that little tube in her hands. </p><p>She waved a hand and the table he was on spun around under its own power so his back was to her. Oh yes, he’d….almost forgot what being with Eve was like. “Sounds like a plan.” His voice came out slightly shakier than he’d have wanted. Directly ahead of him was a portrait Eve had done of herself. Utterly abstract but unmistakably her. He felt like it was smirking at him.</p><p>“Why does,” Eve takes a moment, “the May girl have a backrub token to give you?” Eve asked and Zuke considered that a big step up. No more pedestrian girl, she remembered part of her name. </p><p>“We have an elaborate chore slash barter system.” Zuke said looking at the portrait ahead of him, sure the lines were moving bit by bit. “You know do the dishes, the laundry, walk Ellie-” </p><p>“She needs walked?”</p><p>“She does.” Zuke nodded. “Some days you just don’t feel like it. So May one day offered up a token to let me pick what we watched on movie night.” Zuke chuckled. “Since then it’s been a lot of coupons and tokens.” He held up his hand. “Movie night tokens, take out choice, backrubs, Ellie walking and a lot more.” Zuke laughed a little. </p><p>“You only had one, is she sparing with them?” </p><p>“I mean we had a brief explosion of too many tokens and that would have to have both or neither of us ever picking another movie for sixty day.”  Zuke wanted to turn around, he could hear Eve at his back. “So I try and use them up quickly rather than risk a market collapse.” </p><p>“Sensible.” Eve said. “Is she...good at backrubs?” </p><p>“She’s pretty good.” Zuke said. “I don’t have a lot of metric but it feels nice, guitarist hands you know.” Zuke raised his hands and moved his fingers. “She’s good at pressure. Sometimes her hands are a little rough.” </p><p>“Oh.” Eve places something down on the table. “I see. I shall endeavour to match or exceed her skills. I hope you do not mind if I speak to you during this.” </p><p>“Well it’s not a comPEA-” Zuke sat up, back locking up when he felt Eve’s hands slap down on his shoulders, wet and warm. He let out a low sound, not at all unlike a scared dog as he felt Eve’s hands slide under his jacket.  “Whaaaat are you-”</p><p>“This jacket doesn’t really cover much does it?” Eve said absently. “Aesthetically it’s nice but honestly Zuke you’re not exactly hiding anything in this ensemble. Have you considered a scarf, honestly you’ve got a neck for a scarf.”</p><p>“Huaah.” Zuke said as Eve’s hands moved across his shoulders, he felt himself lean forward to give her better access. “You’re….to talk.” He said. A word was missing he was sure, her hands were so warm. </p><p>“Yes but I’m not exactly trying to. Traditional clothing interferes with my abilities, not to mention how just uninspired so much of it is.” She went on as the heels of her palms pressed against his shoulder blades. Zuke despite himself let out a low groan. “Very tense back here. Are you sure the girl knows how to do this?” </p><p>“It’s….been tense days.” Zuke said. “Since the conc...concert.” He struggled for a moment feeling something tugging at his back. He raised his hands...the jacket was gone, he guessed. “We’ve been getting a lot of questions about the show. Fans wanting to know why an NSR artist was at our gig, is all forgiven and is this some sort of collab project?” </p><p>“Hm there’s a thought.” Eve said absently, her finger teased the edges of Zuke’s shirt. “I’m amazed you humour them. I’ve not spoken to a journalist unless it was absolutely necessary. Even then I told them precisely what I wanted and left.” </p><p>“We kinda can’t avoid journalists.” Zuke muttered, the pressure on his back gone. Eve picked up that little tube. “Our PR team is us and an alligator that can be bribed with treats.” Zuke said. “For every good guy we meet there’s a couple bad ones.” </p><p>“Hmm, that does sound a chore.” Eve said. “Now just a moment, I want to get a sketchpad.” She moved away, her feet tapping across the ground. Zuke turned around slightly to see her walk away. Still a hand hung an inch from his face, an eye in the palm regarded him before with a single finger it turned him back to face forward. </p><p>The arms from the ceiling put a gentle pressure back on his shoulders, knuckles pressing firmly into his shoulder blades. Slow, circles of pressure working their way down his back. Hands sliding under his shirt, equally placed and precise in their applications of pressure. Zuke let out a groan he hoped was quiet, it wasn’t. </p><p>“Your posture was always enviable, Zuke.” Eve said. “You always stand up so straight and tall. I wanted to sketch your back while I worked on it.” A drawer closing somewhere. “I can do both quite easily after all.” </p><p>His head had lolled forward, allowing the hands extending from the ceiling ample room to work on his shoulders. They’d fairly easily slid down the back of his shirt with no resistance. Slow, circles working down and with every rotation he was fairly certain he was going to melt away. Once they reached his waist they started back up, thumbs pressing tight against the area around his spine. </p><p>“From my reading the best actions are repeated and where possible concentric.” Eve’s voice by his ear. “There are more through forms of massage but I don’t think we need to risk anything that severe.” </p><p>“Nah this great.” Zuke said his voice heavy and words slurred. “You’re really good.” He said. “Hands are warm.” </p><p>“Well when you can form igniting heat packets beneath your skin with a thought it’s not hard.” Eve said looking at her hands. A slight flex and her palms radiated heat as a boiling plasma ignited just below her skin. A quick squeeze and it was gone. </p><p>“Oh yuh, I bet.” Zuke said feeling her arms slide free of his shirt, fingers trailing lines of fire up his back. He was sure that was it, it had to be. He felt like he was going to stand up and flop bonelessly to the ground. “That was-” </p><p>“This next part might feel slightly odd but I am certain it will be relaxing.” Eve told him, the faint scratching of pencil  heard as she spoke. Zuke was about to ask what she meant when he felt a squeeze from both sides. He turned his head to find on either side of him a pair of large hands. </p><p>“Eve.” He said quietly as the massive hands grew thinner, tighter and slid themselves under his shirt at the waist. “I--ohhhh.” He wanted to say something but the moment he felt her grip around him it vanished. </p><p>A pair of thumbs, that took up easily the entirety of his back alone pressed down hard and worked in a tight circle. The paper thin fingers, teased his sides rolling across his skin before the warmth and pressure of her grip spread the length of his spine. The tips of her fingers, slid gingerly against his sides teasing under his ribs and sending shivers of warmth up into his chest. At times he was sure she just squeezed him to remind him her hands were there, all over and all encompassing.  </p><p>Eve was more than a little delighted at the noises she was eliciting from Zuke. She’d done a share of reading on how best to help someone relax. A bit trifling and a mite slow, she realized that quite honestly she was equipped to make the whole process a great deal faster and in theory more enjoyable. Theory no longer judging by the way Zuke melted in her grip, leaning this way and that and honestly making more noise than she’d ever heard from him. </p><p>Through the other arms, though not directly attached to her she was still their origin. She could feel the tightness evaporate at her meerest touch. It might not have been the orthodox method but honestly when was it with her? He was utterly delighted in her grip, her touch was the thing that at this time brought him the utmost peace and tranquilitiy. She drew a small series of doodles in the corner of her study. </p><p>IN front of him the eyes in dozens of paintings twisted, narrowed and moved to allow her better all around vision of every eye flutter, slack jawed groan and flop of his head. If she let him go she imagined he might actually flop in half at the waist, a puppet cut free of his strings.</p><p>“Zuke, still with me?” Eve asked after finishing up her sketches. </p><p>“Uh huh.” He moaned. “A little...more and I might be done.” </p><p>“Oh? We still have other parts to do. The rolling, the sides and the wave.” Eve counts off on her fingers. “We’re barely half way done.” Eve breathed and she noticed the way he tried his best to stay rigid, his best to stay sitting up but it was a losing battle. He was all but running between her fingers at this point.</p><p>“Oh Eve.” He moaned, turning to face her, his face almost entirely red. “You might actually turn me into a liquid at this rate.” He laughed as she continued to apply pressure the length of his back. “This is a lot.” </p><p>“Oh.” Eve stood up and paced around Zuke, her hands not stopping. His eyelids fluttered slightly as she stood in front of him. Sketches in hand, very basic anatomy studies with outlined musculature. “Phenomnal muscles, but I suppose wth how you play it's not a surprise.” She made a gesture and the arms from the ceiling slide down the top of his shirt again, drawing slow circles down the back of his arms. </p><p>He saw the little drawings in the corner of his face, oh god was that the sort of face he was making? Oh no those can never ever get out, those can never leave this room.</p><p>“You’re actually….” He never got the rest out as Eve smiled at him. No, it was...he could just let her do what she wanted. He might have said he’d stop doing that but...surely this was some kind of exception. </p><p>“I suppose I have to confess, there’s a slightly selfish reason for this.” Eve sat beside Zuke, her hands were still moving all over his back, down his arms, fingers teasing and rubbing away. “During our little...incident.” Eve said flatly. “I realized how,” she placed a hand on Zuke’s cheek, “tactile we were.” </p><p> </p><p>“You, me and even the girl May.” Eve said. “I didn’t mind you so much.” Eve sighed. “I suppose you couldn’t help but be close. Within me.” She smiled warmly at the memory. “Leaning on one another, holding one another it was...nice. Mayday is rather demanding, pulls and tugs and shakes you around entirely at her own will. But still…” She looked at her hands. “I think I missed that, solitary shows and the like.” </p><p>“Yuh.” Zuke said, aware on some level of this conversation. “She’s a hugger.” </p><p>“We used to be a lot more like that.” Eve said. “I missed...touch. I remember touch. I wanted more…” She reached out slowly. “Zuke...can I hold your hand?” </p><p>He held out his hand, palm up and open to her. She placed her hand in his. She squeezed tight, rubbing her fingers between his. He felt her lean against him as slowly her other arms withdrew from his body. He let out a long sigh, he felt as if he’d been worked over by...well...by a team of specialists at this point. He wasn’t sure he could move without his knees folding up. </p><p>“This is good.” Eve told him. “I’d like to do this more. Touch.” She reached out and took his other hand in hers. He didn’t fight it, honestly he wasn’t sure he could move much right now without shattering into goo. </p><p>“Yeah.” Zuke breathed. “I think….we can do that.” </p><p>“I’m going to make a new album, Zuke.” Eve told him and he nodded against her shoulder. “Percussion focused. Withinfinite is a nice title.”</p><p>“Fantastic title.” Zuke agreed with her. He looked down at her hand in his, her knuckles going white.</p><p>“I’d like you to do a guest track on the album.” She said and his eyes shot open at that. “Not directed, not enforced, just...I want you to play something and be a part of it with me.” The room was quiet after that, just the two of them. Hand in hand, he could feel her squeeze tighter as the silence went on. </p><p>“Just...a solo track?” He asked pointedly.</p><p>“Please” Eve said. “Entirely at your own discretion, Mayday can assist. It can be a Bunk Bed Junction guest track, but...you write it. It has to come from you.” </p><p>“You don’t have to do all this, you know.” Zuke said. “We can visit and hang out. If you wanna...touch or speak we don’t need excuses or reasons on the side or for me to be trapped inside you. We can just.” He held up their hands. “I don’t mind.” </p><p>“It’s not an excuse.” She protested. “They are bonuses.” She corrected quickly. “What do you think?” </p><p>“I think….” He exhaled as he spoke. “It’s dicey….but if left to our devices to make the track how we want to make the track. Mayday would love to do it and I can’t see a reason to say no. Our track. Our way.”</p><p>“Entirely, Zuke. No outside interference.” Eve went on. She went to stand but Zuke hissed. “Is something the matter?”</p><p>“Eve I am so relaxed if you move I am gonna fall over.” Zuke pleaded. Eve slid slightly and Zuke wavered. She moved a little more. “I beg you.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thus concludes the first in what might be a series or not. It's a decent ending but i like to leave the door open, just a crack. Thanks to everyone who reads, kudos and posts a comment. You all make it worth it. Remember, a messy page trumps an empty one.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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